Resilient Cities: Beirut

Makram Younis is an online MFA student living in Lebanon. Makram has been working on a case study for one of his classes that focusses on Martyrs’ Square in Beirut, Lebanon and he felt inspired to share more of his story with our community at the AAU School of Landscape Architecture. Makram is seeing great transformations occur in his country. Artists, designers, and architects of the natural world co-create an identity of their home and celebrate their culture in the “urban jungle” of Beirut.

Makram writes…

“My name is Makram Younis, and I’m from Lebanon. Only a few of you may know about my country and so I wanted to share this video showing you the lives of artists living in Lebanon. As for the natural landscape of Lebanon, the country has two chains of mountains from north till south known by the various ecological life and forests. On the other hand, the cities, especially Beirut, became concrete jungle with very few parks and trees. I’m from the mountains. I was born and lived in a big 250 year old house made of stone. My connection to nature is so strong it’s as if it is my home. This is what made me interested in learning about Landscape Architecture and learn how to improve landscapes to reconnect us with our original home. Cities are dramatically changing the world into to concrete jungles without realizing the importance of Landscape.”

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