Charles Ayrout

Charles Habib Ayrout (Arabic: شارل حبيب عيروط) was an architect practicing in Cairo and is considered as one of that city's Belle Epoque/Art Déco (1920–1940) architects for his landmark buildings and villas.^[1]

Family

His father, Habib Ayrout, was a Syrio-Lebanese architect and contractor practicing in Cairo. After being educated in Paris as an engineer-architect, Habib Ayrout participated in the planning and construction of Heliopolis.^[2]

Charles Ayrout had two brothers Henry Habib Ayrout and Max Ayrout who was also an architect practicing in Cairo.^[2]

Style

Ayrout was part of a movement of French educated Syrio-Lebanese Egyptian architects, who were strongly influenced by the French 'modern classicism' of Michel Poux-Spitz and Pol Abraham. This movement also included Antonine Selim Nahas and Raymond Antonious.^[3]

Works in Cairo include^[4]

• ?? Bldg, 26 July/Hassan Sabri, Zamalek
• ?? Bldg, Bab al-Louk
• Ayrout Bldg, Cherif Pasha Street
• Bldg Shawarby Street
• Ayrout Villa, Zamalek
• Mosseri Building (now Mofti) on Shagaret Al Durr St., Zamalek
• Bishara Bldg, Nile Avenue
• Halim Doss Bldg, Midan Shafakhana
• Ibrahimieh Secondary School, Garden City
• Kahil Bldg, Kantaret al-Dikka
• Bldg Gamal el Dine Abou El Mahassen, Garden City (1951)
• Villa Valadji, Heliopolis

See also

• Heliopolis (Cairo Suburb)
• Heliopolis style

References

1. ^ Mercedes Volait Le Caire-Alexandrie: Architectures Européennes 1850-1950 (co-edition IFAO/CEDEJ 2001)
2. ^ ^{a b} Timothy Mitchell Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity, University of California Press, 2002, pg. 332
3. ^ R. Stephen Sennott (editor), Encyclopedia of 20th Century Architecture, Vol. 1, Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2004, pg. 202
4. ^ Cairo's Belle Époque architects 1900 - 1950, compiled by Samir Raafat

Further reading

Studies where Ayrout's work is discussed:

• L’identification d’un ensemble urbain du XXème siècle en Egypte: Héliopolis, Le Caire. by Mercedes Volait and Claudine Piaton.
• L'inscription du discours occidental dans l'architecture et l'urbanisme orientaux by M Zakarya.
• Jaroslaw Dobrowolski and Agnieszka Dobrowolska, Heliopolis: Rebirth of the City of the Sun, American University in Cairo Press, 2006.
• Le rêve fou d’un baron belge by Nabila Massrali and Amira Doss. Al-Ahram Hebdo, 27 April 2005, Issue No. 555.
• "A Change in Looking" (on Bauhaus style) by Sonali Pahwa. Al-Ahram Weekly, 22–28 April 2004, Issue No. 687.

On the Belle Époque architecture in Cairo:

• Cynthia Myntti, Paris Along the Nile: Architecture in Cairo from the Belle Epoque, American University in Cairo Press, 2003.
• Trevor Mostyn, Egypt's Belle Epoque: Cairo and the Age of the Hedonists, Tauris Parke Paperbacks, 2006.
• A list of Cairo's Belle Époque architects 1900 - 1950, compiled by Samir Raafat.

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