Morocco’s south typical villages – sustainable habitats
Morocco’s countryside is blessed with hundreds of pise ( adobe) hamlets, crumbling villages where life seems to have deserted the place and the only thing to do is reminisce about the past. These habitats articulated life itself in the pre Saharian oases, with their honeycomb architecture, favoring an ideal temperature insulation. In the warm months of summer, the proximity of the walls, the natural shade created by the roofed alleys made for bearable temperatures. In winter, the opposite happened – the adobe doesn’t conduit the cold, as concrete might. In an age where organic and ecological get thrown around a lot, it is hard to fathom something more sustainable than the pise, literally being made of river bed clay, straw and occasional animal dung. Due to people like Salima Naji and David Goeury, the last few years have seen a reinvesting of these ksours by their former inhabitants and an increasing re- awareness of the benefits of such lodging. While on a private tour in the south of Morocco, why not have a tea with the locals and witness first hand how they are involved restoring it ?
