World-Renowned Egyptian Architect Shahira Fahmy at Our University!

About Shahira Fahmy
Born in 1974, Shahira grew up in Cairo. She graduated from the Department of Architecture, Faculty of Engineering, Cairo University in 1997 and completed her master's degree in architecture in 2004. Between 1999 and 2002, she worked for Dar Al Handasah, one of the leading engineering firms in the Middle East. She also worked as a teaching assistant in the architecture department of Cairo University between 1999 and 2007.

Fahmy made her most important professional leap in 2004, when she was commissioned to design a major part of the new campus of the American University in Cairo, which has become one of Egypt's important architectural landmarks. Since then, Fahmy has built an impressive multinational client list including SODIC, Solidere and Abercrombie & Kent.

SFA's innovative designs and original material combinations have brought it great renown in international magazines, books and periodicals such as Thames and Hudson, the Financial Times, Frame, Interior Design Magazine USA, Wallpaper and the Herald Tribune-Daily Star. From a modern approach to the classic teapot to high-quality apartment blocks in Cairo's developing suburbs, SFA's original aesthetic has earned it a global reputation beyond its home country. It has taken part in major exhibitions including "Salone Internazionale del Mobile Salone Satellite 2007" (Milan, Italy, 2007) and "100% Design 2007" (London, UK).

Thanks to her talent and innovations, Shahira has also won many international awards. Most recently, her "Westown - Block 36" project received an award from the World Architecture Community in the 2010 "WA Awards 20+10+X 6th Cycle". In 2009, the "Westown - Block 36" project was also shortlisted at the World Architecture Festival in Barcelona in the "Future Buildings - Housing" category, and at the Architecture - Skyscraper awards in Dubai in the "Housing and Future" category. It also received a commendation in the "Regeneration and Master Planning" category of the MIPIM and Architectural Review Future Projects awards in Cannes.

Private Residence, Cairo, Egypt

Despite the backdrop of Cairo, architectural design brought into the public realm, contextual analyses, enjoyable experiences and sensitivity to social responsibility have contributed to SFA's success. Today, SFA works with 26 architects and continues to grow without compromising its design-driven approach.

Pyramids Heights Residence, Giza, Egypt

Founded in 2004, Shahira H. Fahmy Architects (SFA) addresses physical and social contexts, in which shaping the form and simultaneously revealing the building's potential are key, by interpreting them together with the landscape surrounding the building. SFA provides planning and design services from the concept stage to final-stage construction supervision. The studio works like a laboratory where ideas are tested at every scale, from the city to material properties and production. Indeed, Shahira is an architect who seeks to strike a balance between existing and new spatial concepts in search of a language based on culture, tradition, urban morphologies and climate, covering every scale from the urban scale to interior and product design.

Conference: 13 April 2010, 19:00; Bahçeşehir University Beşiktaş Campus