Memory of the City series – Maadi: The Green Suburb

The newly published book Maadi: On the History and Culture of a Green Suburb, edited by Professor Nezar AlSayyad of the University of California, Berkeley, was officially launched on 11 January 2026. The volume offers a rich, interdisciplinary exploration of Maadi, one of Cairo’s most distinctive suburban landscapes, tracing its evolution from a green, landscape-driven settlement to a more complex and contested urban environment. The book brings together contributions from a diverse group of scholars and practitioners, examining Maadi through themes of landscape, ecology, architecture, urban form, mobility, memory, and cultural representation. Prof Amir Gohar, an ESLA member of IFLA Africa has a chapter in the book, on the public spaces, Nile access and the transformation of Maadi’s landscape.

One chapter, “Maadi: From Landscape City to Concrete City,” critically reflects on how planning decisions, development pressures, and socio-economic change have reshaped Maadi’s environmental and spatial identity over time. Together, the essays present Maadi not only as a physical place, but as a lived and remembered landscape, raising important questions about urban transformation, heritage, and the future of green suburbs in rapidly growing cities. Read more about the book launch here.

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