The Burj Al Murr (Murr Tower, Beirut Trader Center) stands unfinished, soaring from Beirut’s skyline, filled with scars, constantly provoking the city’s residents, whose past is shadowed by war, and present is spent dealing with those harsh memories.
Construction of the tower started in 1974, a year prior to the start of the civil war, to house office, retail, and restaurant space. Due to it being the highest structure at the time and ‘ideally’ located above the ‘Green Line’ that divided West and East Beirut, militias utilized the tower as a spot for snipers.
Interior Architect and artist, Jad El Khoury, renowned for adding colorful doodles to several of Beirut’s war-scarred buildings, installed colorful window shades to the tower, aptly naming the installation ‘Burj Al Hawa’ as the wind blowing the shades echoes a dancing tower, resurrecting the tower back to life, and painting smiles on the resident’s faces.
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