Mapping Informality, Engaging Creativity

A public lecture by Omar Nagati and Omar Khaled of CLUSTER — Cairo Lab for Urban Studies, Training and Environmental Research. Thursday 19 September 17:00 – 18:30 (Doors open at 16:30). Free entrance, but registration is required. Register here

Omar Nagati (left) and Omar Khaled (right) of CLUSTER — Cairo Lab for Urban Studies, Training and Environmental Research.

In absence of state provisions, most cities in the Global South are largely developed through informal urban processes. Professional architects and urban planners are risking becoming irrelevant. Based in Cairo, CLUSTER has been developing over the past decade frameworks to engage informality on its own terms, through critical mapping and action research, while proposing creative design interventions. Considered as grounded urban practices, these projects attempt to mediate academic training and institutional codes, on the one hand, and local practices and practical knowledge, on the other. The presentation also features one of CLUSTER's most recent projects in collaboration with AP+E and Studio Rene Boer in the Netherlands; a compact emergency vehicle on a tricycle frame, suited to navigate narrow streets in informal neighbourhoods.

Programme

16:30 Doors open

17:00 - 17:10 Welcome by the Independent School and introduction by Rene Boer

17:10 - 18:00 Lecture "Mapping Informality, Engaging Creativity" by Omar Nagati and Omar Khaled

18:00 - 18:30 Conversation with the audience

18:30 Drinks at the bar

About Omar Nagati
Omar Nagati is an architect and urban planner, and the Principal and co-founder of CLUSTER, an urban design and research platform in Cairo. He studied at Cairo University, UBC, Vancouver and UC Berkeley with a specific focus on informal urbanism, and taught at a number local and international universities. He is a former visiting professor at the University of Sheffield, and is a member of Global Council for Creative Economy at the British Council, UK. His work at CLUSTER has been the recipient of a number of awards including Cairo Design Award and Curry Stone Design Price, representing Egypt in a number of architecture and urban biennales in Venice, Lisbon, and Seoul.

About Omar Khaled Mohamed
Omar Khaled Mohamed, a multidisciplinary architect at CLUSTER - Cairo Lab for Urban Studies, Training and Environmental Research, obtained his Bachelor’s Degree in Architectural Engineering with honors from the American University in Cairo in 2023. Believing in the intersection of duty towards the city and its inhabitants and the power of individual and collective creativity in spatial praxis, his inquiries are grounded in socio-political and economic mechanisms as well as environmental matters in the built environment. His graduation project, Paradoxical Union – A Civic Institution in Nasr City, gained international acclaim for the World's 100 Top Architecture Graduation Projects, Tamayouz Excellence Awards. In addition to architectural explorations, Omar is also a visual artist. His artistic expression encompasses painting, photography and collage-art, through which he further explores spatial themes related to collective human experiences.