For those of you who don’t know, on 28th of March 2014, the government decided to demolish the National Democratic Party building which was burned during the Jan 25th Revolution in 2011. They also decided to allocate its site to create an extension for the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

According to Ali’s description, the idea of the project was to link and connect the Egyptian Museum to the Nile River via a direct path passing through the museum’s extension, and making a marina for the cruise ships and boats in front of the museum. Not only that, the entire project surface area will be turned into a huge garden above the extension itself.

From: "Landscape Middle East" Magazine, February 2019 issue. Published article.

So basically, the Egyptian Museum’s building which would be built underground will be seen from the Nile River, and the whole surface site would be a museum’s garden, including the external exhibition spaces.

According to designer Ali Khaled’s vision, the Egyptian Museum will be more than just a museum. Because the project will mainly consist of a large museum garden for ancient Egyptian statues, temporary exhibitions, spaces for cultural activities, multipurpose halls, auditorium, retail spaces, restaurants and cafeterias, and a great plaza surrounding the artificial lake linked with the Nile river for events and concerts.

Ali is also intending to maximize the garden’s area in order to create a green envelope that surrounds the outdoor spaces, so that they are isolated from the surrounding tall, non-historic and massive buildings around the museum.

So in other words, once you step in there, you will seclude yourself from any distractions outside.

That’s not all. According to the design, the project site is planned to be accessible for pedestrians only, but not vehicles, in order to reduce air pollution and achieve a better quality of life for the surrounding urban context.

I proudly announce that my project "Egyptian Museum Extension at Cairo - Linking Museum to Nile" was officially published in "Landscape Middle East" magazine, February 2019 issue.

Check the link below, the article is available at pages 40,41,42 and 43.

Obviously this project is all kind of impressive. And we are not the only ones who think so.

Ali Khaled’s project for the Egyptian Museum Extension has been published in international architecture publications such as “Landscape Middle East” magazine, February 2019 issue, and “Berlogos” website in which it was published in both English and Russian.

As impressive as this project’s design is, it is still just a design. What we need is for it to come to life so we can have an amazing new version of our very own Egyptian Museum.

For that to happen, we all need to show Ali our support and appreciation of his talent and ambitious idea, so he can submit it to the authorities and we can, one day, see it in real life.

From "Berlogos", the Russian architecture magazine.
Article was published in both Russian and English Languages.

Check link below for the full article: