The Alhambra is a palace, or rather a complex of two palaces built by two successive caliphs in the 14th century, Yusuf I (1333-1353) and Mohammed V (1353-1391). These two palaces are surrounded by an older fortress (10th century), crowning a 700-meter-long rocky outcrop with reddish walls (Al-Hamra means red). The two palaces are contiguous. They form a single complex organized around two patios. The overall plan is asymmetrical, with the two patios set at right angles to each other. Circulation is tortuous. In the 14th century, it’s hard to imagine an architect who didn’t like regularity and symmetry! Here, all is refinement: the earthenware mosaics on the floors, the sculpted plasterwork on the walls, the carved, sculpted and painted woodwork on the ceilings – everything is a declension of geometric, floral or epigraphic motifs. It’s all part of a complex yet harmonious decor. To understand this distribution of spaces, so radically different from the Florentine palace or Renaissance ch\u00e2teau, is to understand an architecture that develops from within, not from the fa\u00e7ade, that uses geometry to conceal the plan rather than display it. An architecture that fears neither asymmetry nor the clash of volumes, that knows how to use hollows to turn the plan of buildings around an invisible axis.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Alhambra is a palace, or rather a complex of two palaces built by two successive caliphs in the 14th century, Yusuf I (1333-1353) and Mohammed V (1353-1391).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":149501,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"program_type":[15],"group":[2486,545,548],"d_category":[663],"genre":[2491],"class_list":["post-149500","program","type-program","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","program_type-episode","group-architecture-et-design","group-decryptage","group-visites","d_category-archi-and-design","genre-documentary"],"yoast_head":"\n