Tour Description:

This photography-themed tour of Downtown was based on the research done for the “Studio Viennoise” exhibition held in 2012, which focused on the great portrait studios of the 1950s and 1960s.

Most have disappeared; one of the last of them, Nubar Keropian of Studio Kerop, closed just one month before the tour. Geday’s photographic series Lost and Last also tracks these haunting traces.

The tour followed the tracks and hunted for the remaining artifacts of these lost temples of glamour. It started with one of Downtown’s last operating studios, which now specializes in passport photos, but still maintains an impressive collection of hand-painted portraits in a very mysterious setting.

The tour also stopped at “Bella,” a studio that has been active for more than a century. It concluded with the legendary Lehnert and Landrock, one of the oldest surviving photography establishments, which also hosts a mini museum.

Tour Leader:

• Paul Geday. View Profile.

Tour is developed in collaboration with Paul Geday. Tour itinerary and data based on “Last and Lost” studios of Cairo (P. Geday), a work in progress that was part of “On photography, at Studio Viennoise” exhibition, © Paul Geday 2012, 2015 All rights reserved including electronic publishing, databases, social media or otherwise.

Photographs © Paul Geday, All rights reserved. Captions by Paul Geday, as part of the “Last and Lost” series.

Tour Description:

Based on CLUSTER’s extensive research on downtown Cairo’s passageways, this tour explored Downtown’s network of passages, back alleys, side streets and in-between spaces, which house an array of commercial and entertainment activities. These activities extend to the gaps between buildings, setbacks, courtyards, and a number of side streets that were either officially or de facto pedestrianized. Uses of these spaces range from food places and coffee shops, to sites for trade and retail, including stationery stores and bookstores, bars and restaurants, galleries and art spaces. Being off the main channels of traffic, they operate as hubs for competing interests and claims to space. Viewed together, they offer an opportunity to re-envision Downtown as a network of pathways housing commerce and entertainment.

Tour Leader:

• Omar Nagati. View profile.

This tour is developed in reference to CLUSTER’s publication Cairo Downtown Passageways: Walking Tour and accompanying website: passageways.clustermappingintitiative.org. Photos © CLUSTER

Tour Description:

This tour aimed to encourage biking through downtown Cairo, and exploration of the city at a different pace. Cairo, being the flat city that it is, has great potential for being a bike-friendly space with a reduced carbon footprint. The participants of this tour got to enjoy a journey through downtown Cairo, discovering historical sites, in-between spaces, and modern-day cultural hubs; all by bicycle. The tour embarked in Tahrir Square and culminated in the courtyard of Townhouse Gallery of Contemporary Art and Tak‘iba Café.

Tour Leader:

• Dirk Wanrooij (View profile)
• Nancy Naser Al Deen (View profile)

Tour was developed in collaboration with Ain Bicycles. Photos © CLUSTER

Tour Description:

Using films shot on location in downtown Cairo, this tour explored how filmmakers used the iconic landscapes of Downtown to tell different stories over the past five decades. Whether in posing as a spectacular backdrop in classical black-and-white movies, or by reflecting more turbulent moods via its alleyways and rooftops in contemporary setups, this multi-layered zone has always lured the cinematic eye to use and abuse it in its own way.

As it harbored the most glamorous cinema theaters in the city, Downtown was at once the medium and the message of these movies, creating a double mirror effect that reveals the ever-entangled relation between the city and its Egyptian cinematic representation. These movies raise questions about changes in public space and the urban experience: from mobility and restriction, to diversity and demographic change, to mainstream and underground cultures. The tour culminated with a screening of short scenes from films shot in Downtown followed by a critical discussion with the tour guides.

Tour Leader:

• Aida El Kashef  (View profile)
• Mohammed Gawad. (View profile)

This tour was developed in reference to Vittoria Capresi and Barbara Pampe, eds., Discovering Downtown Cairo: Architecture and Stories, Berlin: Jovis, 2014, courtesy of baladilab.

With additional input from Mohamed Elshahed. Photos: © Maria Hänichen, Sandra Mrowet.

Tour Description:

This tour focused on the Cairo of the literati, as represented in their literary works. The sites visited are integral to the writers’ personal histories and their literary production.

From the American University in Cairo’s historic Ewart Hall and the neighboring French Lycée, to Tahrir Square and Cairo’s Downtown bars, cafés, cultural venues, and clubs, the tour mapped the various impacts of these iconic places on Cairo’s authors, as well as the extent to which the places have been transformed over time, for both the city and the works’ authors.

The tour culminated in a discussion at the Automobile Club with the tour leader.

Tour Leader:

• Samia Mehrez. View profile.

This tour was developed in collaboration with Samia Mehrez with reference to her books: The Literary Atlas of Cairo: one hundred years in the life of the city. Cairo; New York: The American University in Cairo Press, 2010 and The Literary Life of Cairo: one hundred years in the heart of the city. Cairo; New York: The American University in Cairo Press, 2011.