21/01/2026
I arrived in AlUla today, and it’s one of those places that resets your calibration. It is not just the landscape (though it is hard to ignore) but the way culture here feels anchored in material, climate, and time. And yes: in January it’s almost freezing! It somehow makes the desert even more precise.
Tomorrow I’ll speak at Arts Alula Festival on “material witness”, together with urban planner Sara Ghani, architect Salwa Samargandi and moderator Sumantro Ghose.
To me, this is going to be about how architecture and everything that supports it can be built from within: from place, heritage, and the realities of heat, shade, wind, and night... But let's see what everyone has to say tomorrow! It will be fascinating.
I'll be bringing a simple idea: light is a material. It can reveal a surface honestly, or it can turn it into scenery. It can honour darkness (and the Dark Sky is amazing over here in AlUla) or it erases it. And in a context like this, that choice is not just aesthetic... It is cultural.
I am happy to be here, and I am looking forward to all the conversations.
