- The house of Almadina Almonawara in Saudia arabia   15 kb by    Khairy, Amin & null, null & null, null | zfpm@tri.net.sa    Short Outline The city has been analyzed and described in many ways; such as a social system, economic system, communication system, …etc. It is seen as an amalgamation of multiple physical and deep structured factors interacting within an inseparable whole. These factors are not arbitrary, but operate within a specific system of interrelated relationship. The city of Al-Madina Al-Monawarah , the second religious center for Muslims, has special attention for its most vital and important role in serving visitors from all over the Islamic region. In such a holy area, the idea of developing the central area surrounding the Prophet’s Mosque has emerged as a result of many aspects. Such aspects could be summarized through the continuously increasing number of visitors, the great demand of available residential units and their related services, in addition to the deteriorated urban fabric of the central area and its disability of fulfilling visitors needs. In the field of Urban Design & Planning, the project of developing the central area of Al-Madina Al-Monawarah represents a very special and remarkable situation. The replacement of the area took place through demolishing the whole old city, which re-constructed according to a new master plan. The procedure of this project started in 1991. Accordingly, new housing settlements have been emerged. One can argue that these built environments have been shaped mainly by technology and economic consideration. Urban forms provide only the utilitarian needs with neglect of the values that relate people to their own environment. By the absence of these common values, many notions such as inside- outside, private-public, here- there, have been missed. In order to test the availability of such these notions nowadays within the architectural language, the study of housing unit – in Al-Madina Al-Monawarah- was chosen as it forms one of the main components of the built environment. Special attention will be oriented towards the following: Organization of space, living space, copying with the climate, building quality and aesthetics, values, symbols and meanings. Abstract The research aims to study how the house of Al-Madina Al-Monawarah , in Saudi Arabia, expresses the socio/economic changes in new forms and patterns. The research clarified the contradiction between the traditional and modern approach of house design in Al-Madina, and indicated some indigenous components, which still required. It emphasis the need to reconstruct the educational system for both the society and architectural designers. Keywords www.isl.uni-karlsruhe.de/isocarp/cases/cs01_4515/madina house.htm, , Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2001: Honey, I Shrunk the Space   Click to open the full paper as pdf document   Click to send an email to the author(s) of this paper