Contemporary trends in consolidating the heritage and aesthetic identity in the control headquarters of the Faculty of Fine Arts in Omar Touson Palace

Hamed, Esraa Abd El-Fattah Hamed Ahmed

doi:10.21608/mjaf.2025.356084.3566

Contemporary trends in consolidating the heritage and aesthetic identity in the control headquarters of the Faculty of Fine Arts in Omar Touson Palace

Articles in Press

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Esraa Abd El-Fattah Hamed Ahmed Hamed

Decor Department, Faculty of Fine Arts, Alexandria University, Alexandria, Egypt

10.21608/mjaf.2025.356084.3566

Abstract

Heritage buildings play a crucial role in enhancing cultural and national identity. The interior architectural spaces of these buildings, with all their architectural features and styles, are huge opportunities to create new functional spaces that serve contemporary needs. Within the framework of the interest of architecture and interior design engineering in enhancing and preserving built heritage through renovation and development processes, there are significant differences between them and modern buildings in terms of the materials used and even implementation and design techniques. In this regard, we find that the Omar Touson Pasha Palace, the subject of the study, which was previously a residential villa, and its function changed over the years until it became a public space subject to the management of higher education affiliated with the Faculty of Fine Arts, Alexandria University, suffers from many problems related to design and its ability to fulfill its functional purpose. Therefore, this research paper presents a proposed model for developing the interior space of the control headquarters of the Decoration Department at Touson Palace by reformulating it according to contemporary design standards, with the aim of achieving a balance between heritage and modern design for the control space while preserving the old heritage elements with a sustainable mindset that leads to sensing the community's need for built heritage to ensure the protection of its identity and history and its reintegration into society with its contemporary activities that contribute to improving the standard of living environment and raising the quality of life. Urbanism.

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