A contemporary interpretation of the housh – the courtyard at the heart of traditional Emirati architecture – has been selected as the winning Urban Commissions project for this year’s Dubai Design Week.
The installation, titled When does a threshold become a courtyard?, was developed by Some Kind of Practice, a UAE-based studio founded in 2022 by architects Omar Darwish and Abdulla Abbas. The project came as a response to the theme of this year’s Urban Commissions, in which the annual design competition invited participants to rethink the concept of the courtyard.
When does a threshold become a courtyard? will be unveiled at Dubai Design Week, which will be held between November 4 and 9.
A communal space, the housh differs from courtyards found in Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia. Instead of being conceived as a fixed architectural centrepiece, the courtyard emerges gradually, as families grow and homes begin to expand, with privacy needs shaping transitional spaces.
“It wasn’t that buildings were designed from a courtyard first,” Darwish says. “The courtyard came as a result with time, depending on the family, how it grows and wraps a space that becomes a courtyard.”
As such, the housh is not a static architectural form, neither are the materials that define it. Each biome in the UAE shaped the courtyard differently. On the coast, coral reef blocks and arish palm fronds provided shade and enclosure. In the desert, mud brick and arish offered flexible forms. The housh of the mountains, meanwhile, are created by walls of stacked stone.
“When the material changes, it changes the limitations of how big a courtyard could become,” Darwish says. The architect also points out that the courtyard is not traditionally a public space, but is obstructed from view by “a wall of privacy”.
“Courtyards are not like a plaza. You get the privilege to come into a courtyard,” he says. “The courtyard is not open for all, which is a statement we explicitly wanted to make for this project.”
An integral part of this formation is the liwan, the shaded, semi-open hall that precedes the courtyard. It is an intermediate area, a shaded threshold that mediates between the interior space and the courtyard.
It is from this architectural element that the installation gleans its title, When does a threshold become a courtyard?, perhaps nodding to the concept of courtyards as defined by transition and privacy, as opposed to one concrete object.
Drawing from extensive fieldwork and archival research, the installation translates these vernacular principles into a contemporary language of materials, bringing together elements from the varied topologies of the housh.
“Each one of these comes from a different biome and a different period,” Darwish says. “Every single element of our material palette is referenced.”
Vertically stacked breeze blocks reference the stone walls of the mountains, while the roof merges arish with corrugated steel – echoing the pragmatic substitutions families made as their resources increased.
The installation has been conceptualised as an evolving framework, not a nostalgic reconstruction. “There’s a better way, a more poetic way of getting it back to life in a project, rather than just duplicating it exactly how it was,” Darwish says.
Apart from the historical references, the architects chose materials that can be readily acquired from local sources. It has also been designed as a kit of parts, a modular system that can be dismantled and relocated. “It can be a winter camp in Dubai,” Darwish says. “You can take it and add it as the extension of your house, like a mulhaq or annex, if you need one.”
This adaptability reflects the rhythms of traditional life in the UAE, where families historically moved between coastal, desert and mountain dwellings according to the season.
“In our research, we emphasise the flexibility of the space,” Abbas says. “It's a multifunction space.”
This aspect will be highlight at Dubai Design Week, through the layout and materiality of the installation as well as the programming held within.
“We didn’t want to propose a fixed type of furniture arrangement,” Abbas says. “We want it to be something more temporary, something more flexible. So we're talking about using plywood sheets that can be brought in and out of the space. Or, for example, combining a bunch of plywood sheets and it becomes a larger gathering table. You can split up these plywood sheets, and it becomes like a workshop, almost, even with the seating.”
A new take on the liwan topology is key to how the architects reimagine the courtyard. Instead of a literal recreation, they explore the concept of an “implied” liwan.
“We wanted to create a liwan without actually putting in a wall,” Abbas says.
The shaded threshold encourages change and flexibility within the space. “The liwan is what makes the courtyard flexible,” Darwish says. “The implied liwan in our project is what allows the change of things to happen.”
Ultimately, the housh is meant to demonstrate the wisdom of local vernacular architecture, while also showing how it could inspire new forms.
This directive is a philosophical core of Some Kind of Practice. “We’re creating projects that uncover something to people,” Darwish says. “It's very locally based, in the sense that it's always from the UAE to the UAE.”
