Introduction by Leïla el-Wakil
From 'sidereal emptiness' to fertile ground: an 'appropriate' architect
'Guru' and polymath
The right critical distance
The state of the matter
Multiple authors throwing light on Hassan Fathy
1. Education and training by Leïla el-Wakil
The apogee of studies the Western way
2. A family passion for music by Jessica Stevens-Campos
Fathy, the musician and music lover
Muhammad Fathy and oriental music
Architecture through the prism of Western classical music
3. The first commissions by Leïla el-Wakil
The Talkha school project (1928)
The early years, in collaboration with Ahmad Hosni Omar
Project for the Azmi Building in Zamalek
The Bosphore Casino
Project for Hassan Pasha Madkour (1934)
An exhibition pavilion for a tobacco company (1937)
The other modern houses
From the Hayat Muhammad Villa (1938) to the Hussein Farid izba (1941)
4. The early steps of a 'romantic' in a liberal Egypt by Mercedes Volait
The first drawings
Egyptian modernism
Revolutionising rural architecture
5. The qa'a and the Arab house by Leïla el-Wakil
The shift towards the 'inward-looking' house: the qa'a, the centrepiece of the typology
Fathy's art de vivre: refined ambiguity
Cairo houses in the years around 1950
The Neo-Mamluk house of Tusun Abu Gabal
Two villas for Aziza Hassanein (1938 and 1949)
Compositional eclecticism
6. The arts and craftsmanship by Nadia Radwan
Hassan Fathy: an 'artist'?
Fathy and Habib Gorgi: architecture without architects and schools without teachers
Fathy and Ramses Wissa Wassef: art and craft at the heart of the model village
The 'Friends of Art and Life' and Hamed Saïd's 'eco-studio'
From Gourna to the 'House of the Arts': Fathy among Artists
7. Colourful reveries by Ola Seif
The pre-Gourna phase
The Gourna phase
Post-Gourna
The paintings of a fantasist visionary, an architect or a dreamer?
8. Envisioning architecture by Ahmad Hamid
9. The great transformation of the Egyptian peasantry by Samir Radwan
10. The model izba by Leïla el-Wakil
Literary renewal
Architectural renewal and model villages
The Fathy family farms (late 1930s)
Mud brick : the modern invention of a 'heaven-sent' material
The model farm experiments at Bahtim
The Anhouri farm project at Mazghouna
The writings of Mirrit Boutros-Ghali
A model farm for the Fayoum Real Estate Corporation (1943)
Izbat al-Basri (1945)
Hafiz Afifi and Lulu'at al-Sahara (1950)
11. New Gourna by Leïla el-Wakil
The tools of the model village's invention
New Gourna: the African Hellerau
Using tradition to build the present
The project's launch and failure
The projects to save Gourna
12. A narrative in the form of a sonata by Jessica Stevens-Campos
Prelude: Dream and Reality
Chorale: Man, Society, and Technology
Fugue: Architect, Peasant, and Bureaucrat
Finale: Gourna Dormant
13. The villages of the fellahs by Leïla el-Wakil
Plans for an Institute for Ruralism
The Kom Ombo rehousing project
Harraniya: from the Ramses Wissa Wassef Art Centre (begun 1952) to Fathy's renovation project for the village (1964)
New Bariz, the masterpiece brought down by the Six-Day War
An attempted collaboration with the United Nations: the development of the oasis of Dar'iya
The concept of the vegetable-garden village for Sohar
The Sadat Village in Aswan
14. Choisy / Fathy: from constructive rationalism to bioclimatic architecture by Joseph Abram
Tradition/Construction
Physical environment / Materials
Solar protection / Ventilation
15. Clarke / Fathy: reviving traditions by Nicholas Warner
The antiquarian and preservationist
The influence of Coptic architecture
The Use of Mud Brick
Buildings for archaeologists
A new vernacular architecture?
16. Doxiadis Associates: the nerve centre by Camille Abele
First encounters and exchanges
The Doxiadis Associates firm
Two characters face to face
Greater Mussayib
Residential blocks and a neighbourhood for New Baghdad (1959)
Korangi: a model extension of Karachi (1959)
17. From ekistics to 'appropriate urbanism' by Rémi Baudouï
From the countryside to the city: anthropology of the evolution of an active process
Opera minora: the modern city of a Cairene dandy
Reconsiderations between 1937 and the Doxiadis period: abandonment and rediscovery of the city and its implications
The urban projects for Iraq and Pakistan
The 'City of the Future' (CoF) project
The foundations of a theory of 'appropriate urbanism': the case of the Arab city
18. Touristic villages by Leïla el-Wakil
Pioneering ideas for the North Coast
A model tourist accommodation unit at Sidi Krier
The Hammamet Conference (1974)
The proposal to convert New Gourna into a touristic village
Al-Mashrabiya Tourist Centre: a cultural centre for the capital
The Nile Festival Village
Developing cultural tourism in al-Fayoum and elsewhere
A utopia for Sinai and a controversial posthumous project
19. A love of heritage by Leïla el-Wakil
Egyptian heritage institutions
Contributing factors to an infatuation
Tale of the Mashrabiya, an autobiographical story
Nubia submerged: a World Heritage Site (1959-64)
The Hell of Reinforced Concrete
The confrontation with heritage leaders at Pistoia
The International Conference on the History of Cairo
Appraising Cairene heritage
The mosque of Abbasiya
20. Between materiality and spirituality by Leïla el-Wakil
Symbolism versus anthroposophy
The influence of the Groupe de Louxor's spiritual and esoteric studies
Religious architecture in search of symbols
21. East and West by Leïla el-Wakil
The champions of modernity called into question
Scientific research at the service of art
'Appropriate' beauty
An architect on a quest for appropriateness

Acknowledgments
Glossary
Sources
General bibliography