A knowledge marketplace
Trading, making, reading and gathering under one roof.
A hybrid library and market
Al-Balad edge · Jeddah
Sara García Golmar
Yasmeen Hassan
Jonida Dragusha
MaCAD 2026/27 · Team G06
Material concept render · AI-generated, as labelled in the original PowerPoint
The idea
A knowledge marketplace: trading, making, reading and gathering under one roof.
A hybrid market and public library on the edge of Al-Balad (Jeddah’s Old town), aggregated from discrete modules with Monoceros (Wave Function Collapse) for a hot, highly humid climate.
Hybrid functions
Public, porous, and dynamic bazaar. Features craft stalls, local trading, and social dining spaces woven into shaded pedestrian alleys.
Contemplative and acoustically controlled. Provides quiet study chambers, local history archives, and research spaces.
Active production workshops for pottery, woodwork, and traditional plaster carving, bridging learning with commercial making.
Jeddah · City & climate
Jeddah is a major commercial and transport hub on the Red Sea coast of Saudi Arabia.
Located on the Red Sea coast, with high humidity and warm seawater temperatures.
Rapid urban expansion and extensive road networks, increasing distances between destinations.
Extremely hot summers, high humidity and low annual rainfall.
Vernacular architecture
Vertical stratification · Rowshans & Mashrabiyas · thick coral-stone walls · loggias · layered facade
Site selection
Directly adjacent to Lake Al-Arbaeen Park and King Abdulaziz Branch Road.
Al-Bay’ah Square and Alqashlah Road connect the site to transit corridors and the historic bazaar grid.
>2100 kWh/m²
Site solar radiation reported in the presentation calls for passive microclimate mitigation and high thermal massing.
Site observations and environmental figures are retained from the presentation.
Model exploration
Actual solved geometry · mesh previewA 360° view of the solved Rhino geometry. Play or pause the orbit, drag to explore, or use the camera controls.
Module families
Module families
Module construction
Exploded views and plans retain their original drawing detail.
Module construction
Exploded views and plans retain their original drawing detail.
Module construction
Exploded views and plans retain their original drawing detail.
Module construction
The original supplied animation. Use Play animation to view the sequence.
Circulation study
An open, double-height market spine with cross streets every 60 m (max).
Corridors sit above secondary streets and intersect them.
Cores connect streets to corridors and close every corridor to avoid dead ends.
Longest travel distance to a core, from the north tip of corridor C.
Limit 76 m if sprinkleredLongest dead-end corridor.
Limit 6 mPlot ≈ 150 m × ≈ 104 m · Limits per SBC 801 (IBC Table 1017.2), as cited in the source.
Adjacency overview
Street on the ground floor only, as the entrance. Rooftop on the top layer. Market at street level.
Presentation intent. The current programme slots do not establish all three as universal placement constraints.
Core links Street to Corridor; corridors reach the street only through a core.
Dedicated circulation slots are verified. Universal path connectivity is not proven by the rule list alone.
Knowledge never touches Market, keeping the quiet library apart from the souq.
Verified in Disallowed Rules on X, Y and Z.
Source categories · Street · Core · Corridor · Production · Courtyard · Co-working · Market · Knowledge · Observatory
Module connection rules
01 · Public access
street:+X → market:-X
Verified for market 1, market 2 and market 3.
02 · Making + trading
market:+Y → production:-Y
Verified for market 1, market 2 and market 3.
03 · Library access
corridor:+X → knowledge:-X
Verified in the allowed rules.
Module symbols and face directions follow the source presentation. Connection sketches are schematic.
Module connection rules
04 · Shared social space
knowledge:+Y → social:-Y
Presentation rule · social is absent from the active module catalogue.
05 · Programme separation
knowledge:+X → market:-X
Verified by the Disallowed Rules input.
06 · Ground-level street
core:+Z → street:-Z
Verified by street:-Z → core:+Z in Disallowed Rules.
Module symbols and face directions follow the source presentation. Connection sketches are schematic.
Module connection rules
07 · Observatory placement
knowledge:+Z → rooftop:-Z
Presentation rule · rooftop is absent from the active module catalogue; the drawing labels Observatory.
08 · Continuous voids
empty:+Z → empty:-Z
Presentation rule · active Rules contain void:+Z → void:-Z instead.
09 · Keep voids open
empty:+Z → knowledge:-Z
Presentation rule · this exact empty/knowledge pair was not verified in Disallowed Rules.
Module symbols and face directions follow the source presentation. Connection sketches are schematic.
Aggregation
Actual solved geometry · mesh previewComplete model · original GH palette
Library labels in the presentation correspond to Knowledge in the Grasshopper definition.
Reported data
M² TOTAL FLOOR AREA
MODULES
TONNES TOTAL WEIGHT
SAR ESTIMATED COST
PowerPoint headline figures · values and units as supplied.
Function ratios
2,244 solved cells · 1740 modules
The courtyards allow for passive cooling throughout the building and an acoustic buffer.
Production 10.6%, knowledge 9.6%, market 9.5% and co-working 8.2% sit close together.
Street, core and corridor together take 25.0%; void cells add another 23.8% of open space.
Original commentary. The source chart plots Void at 23.40%.
Programme percentages as plotted in the source presentation.
Material and experience
Material and experience
Rowshan screens, stone and timber · supplied exterior render.
Souq Al Ma’rifa
A knowledge marketplace for Jeddah.
Sara Garcia Golmar · Yasmeen Hassan · Jonida Dragusha
Team G06