Lebanon Real Estate Newsletter Vol. 3, Issue 10 - October, 2007

The Samir Kassir Square garden in downtown Beirut has won this year's Aga Khan $500,000 architectural award, which went to a design of Vladimir Djurovic.

The square occupies 815 square meters facing the An Nahar building. Out of 343 nominations, the jury short-listed 27 and awarded none, including the rehabilitation of Shibam (a city mud-brick, high-rise building in Yemen), the restoration of the 16th century Amiriya Complex (a project that employed 500 artisans and craftsmen in Rada, Yemen), and the Koudougou Central Market in Burkina Faso.

Djurovic has two other memorial gardens in the works, one for former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri and another for slain journalist and Member of Parliament Gebran Tueni. All three were assassinated by what seems to be the same killers.

Djurovic is also involved in the Beirut Platinum Tower with Ricardo Bofil and Nabil Gholam, and many other commercial and residential projects locally and in other countries such as Jordan, Qatar, Dubai, Thailand, the U.S, France and India.

In their citation for the Samir Kassir Square, the jury said: "This project conceives the public urban space as a shift in the city's rhythm".

The Aga Khan Development Network Award was created in 1977. From a Serbian father and a Lebanese mother, Djurovic grew up in Beirut and calls Lebanon home. He is a landscape architect and he studied in both Britain and the US. He has a staff of 15, no intention to grow the firm any larger, and a waiting list of at least three months that suits him fine. Like so many architects in Lebanon now, projects outside the country account for 90 percent of his workload.