Field Notes
NAS01 was the founding cohort of the African Futures Institute's pedagogical studio, a Pan-African architectural discourse programme hosted in Fez, Morocco. This documents the research, experiments, and spatial thinking that emerged from that experience.
The Craftsman as Shaman
On craft, ritual, and the architecture of sacred making"What Islam has which was beautiful, is what… was that the crafts were designed to raise the spirituality of the worker. He wasn't working just to get his daily pay, no. He was working because he would be proud of his production. And this is the craftsman. His spirit comes out into the building and that what makes traditional buildings, you feel the sense of the sacred in it because when you go in you feel the presence of the spirit of the worker who was in it, not the bloody contractor with precast things. This is why the crafts are important." , Abdelwahed El-Wakil
When Palo Santo is burned, it emits a musk scent that transports a person to a place they may or may not have been before. Its scent acts as a conduit to a place in memory, and, depending on context, may evoke wonder, joy, playfulness, grounding and release. In this way, Palo Santo is not just a scent stick, it is a vehicle that is able to create an experience where reality is suspended, time ceases to exist and we enter into altered worlds. It becomes a magical object.
The Creator is Created
Zelige, a word possibly as old as the language it comes from, is a great example of the act of making as a transcendental experience. The Fez Medina holds space for this magical act.
For the creator, this act of service is often a selfless offering. The act of creating is one that takes patience, resilience, humility, blood sweat and tears. It takes countless hours of execution to achieve mastery and for this reason, there exists an imbalance where the energy exchange is not adequately fulfilled monetarily. Why then does he do it? Why does he continue to create day in day out, if not for some greater calling?
The craftsman, who over years has honed his skill, becomes an expert through the daily ritual of creating his craft. In creating, he achieves a level of detail that requires total trust in the process. This way, the repeated action of making becomes a ritual that he partakes in every day. His hands that create become the tool that the handicraft uses to emerge.
The Magic of Objects
To create a routine is to surrender to the mundane repetition of an action. In Islam, this is considered a tool that "raises the craftsman's spirituality." To overcome the desire for novelty means to settle into a beat, a hum, a drum that is purely about producing a thing as close to perfect as humanly possible.
This way, crafting becomes spiritual. It becomes a prayer, an offering. And then, when he creates, he offers this to its final user, zelige finds itself gracing the holy grounds of houses, mosques and gravestones. These objects take their place not out of necessity, the building will stand with or without it. The painstaking addition of ornament is a vital expression of emotion, pride of place and the simple desire to appreciate beauty.
For the maker, his spirit is intertwined into the object he creates. Even though he may seem humble, egoless and even detached from this act and its outcome, there is a signature he has left that is uniquely his. And the craft he has created? It instantly shifts the sense of place that we inhabit.
Architecture in Witness
An architecture that emerges from the act of witnessing. Not from the clean slate or the grid, but one that gleans from loss of control, chaos and interruption. Tracing how meaning emerges from mundane, unconscious acts. Collecting evidence of presence. Looking for moments where the ordinary becomes extraordinary.
Trace Meaning from Mundane Acts
Observe interactions with everyday objects. Document fragments of unplanned design charged with presence, where a cup left on a ledge, a shadow on a wall, or a cracked bowl becomes a spatial gesture.
Collect Evidence of Presence
Seek moments of rupture where the ordinary becomes extraordinary through spiritual tension, emotional residue, or memory. The grid acts as a container, and in some cases is disrupted to bring forth a new way to inhabit space.
Translate to Spatial Language
Each documented moment becomes an "event of space." Through sequential diagrams, architectural sections, and material studies, the witnessed event becomes spatial vocabulary, a design language born of life, not theory.
Power of Ten Grid
Map each event across scale, from molecule to urban system. A single witnessed moment contains cosmic, architectural, and cellular scales simultaneously. The grid reveals the architecture already embedded in the act.
Five Witnessed Events
Each event is documented across scales, from the material surface to the urban system, using drawing, photography, sound, and written witness.
Palo Santo, The Ritual of Spiritual Transportation
You light the palo santo. The smoke rises, spirals, fades. The scent anchors you and simultaneously lifts you elsewhere. Time slows. The room is changed. Smoke as ephemeral structure. Scent as invisible mapping of emotion. Fire as ignition of transformation.
Water in a Glass, Light as Dancing Form
A glass of water placed in the sun. Light refracts onto the wall, rippling, moving, ephemeral. A whole space is transformed by something still. Refraction as movement born of stillness. Wall as canvas of projection. Glass as container, lens, amplifier.
The Dyed Dress, Accidental Rebirth
A favourite dress, washed with dark clothes, accidentally stained blackish. But instead of ruin, this transformation invites exploration, permission to continue. Stain as interruption and beauty. Accident as permission. Layering as new self.
The Disappearing Turn, Architecture of the Alleyway
Walking through the tight, winding alleys of Fez. You follow someone, turn a corner, and they're gone. The path narrowed, dipped, or split. You feel lost, but also intensely present. The city is constantly hiding and revealing. You don't walk through Fez, you're claimed by it.
The Morning Bread Doorway, Architecture of Offering
In the early morning, you pass a door and find a bag of warm bread hanging on a knob or a hook. No name, no knock, just an offering. This happens across several homes. It is routine, silent, generous. Threshold as ritual interface. Door as social contract. Architecture as generosity, not enclosure.