SPACE June 2026 (No. 703)
Two of the four car parks in Muharraq, Bahrain, designed by Christian Kerez were demolished by royal decree less than four years after their completion. Celebrated as urban infrastructure for diverse public life beyond parking, their loss sent shockwaves through the architectural community. Through a contribution by Lee Hee Joon, SPACE revisits the architectural significance of the car parks. Editor
Car Park B
Published on 14th of February 2024, issue 224 of El Croquis covered projects designed by Christian Kerez between 2015 and 2024.▼1 The cover image for this issue is a photograph by Jesus Granada of Car Park D, taken from the fourth floor facing towards the north-west, amidst the four car parks – A, B, C and D – that Kerez designed in Muharraq, Bahrain.▼2 This project, which Bjarke Ingels succinctly described as a ‘masterpiece’ after visiting the site in 2025, reached a turning point less than a year later.▼3
In the summer of 2025, Car Park C was demolished. This was followed by the start of the demolition of Car Park A in early 2026.▼4 Around the 20th of March 2026, several social media accounts and architectural media outlets reported the news of the demolition. On March 22, Kerez posted on his Instagram account an article from the Bahraini daily Al Watan, together with an English translation, citing the context that the demolition of Car Parks A and C had been carried out by order of King Hamad bin Isa bin Salman Al Khalifa of Bahrain and formed part of an urban development plan.▼5
Car Park B
The demolition of the two car parks drew public attention in late March not only because buildings had been demolished by royal order less than four years following their completion. The fact that the car parks formed an important part of the ‘Pearling Path’ project, as well as the independent architectural achievement evidenced by the works themselves, was also among the principal reasons for the attention this event received.
The Pearling Path is a project that links heritage sites associated with the pearl-diving industry in Muharraq with newly constructed facilities. Natural pearl diving was Bahrain’s principal industry before the development of cultured pearls and oil fields, and Muharraq, Bahrain’s former capital, was the main setting for the natural pearl-diving industry. A group of heritage sites associated with natural pearl diving – including seventeen buildings such as the houses, shops and mosques of pearl merchants that show the way of life at the time, three oyster beds, and Qal’at Bu Mahir – was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2012 under the name ‘Pearling, Testimony of an Island Economy’.▼6 Meanwhile, the Palestinian architect Noura Al Sayeh Holtrop, who joined Bahrain’s Ministry of Culture▼7 in 2009 as head of architectural affairs, led the Pearling Path from 2015 as a project related to Pearling, Testimony of an Island Economy.▼8 The Pearling Path included not only the improvement of the route beginning at Qal’at Bu Mahir and linking the buildings included in Pearling, Testimony of an Island Economy, and the restoration of building façades along that route by removing elements such as advertising boards attached to them, but also the construction of new public facilities. As part of this project, architects and landscape architects including Al Sayeh Holtrop, Leopold Banchini, Valerio Olgiati, Kersten Geers, David van Severen, Bas Smets, Anne Holtrop and Ch...
