Gardens of Marrakesh

Book excerpt: Nicknamed ‘the rose among the palms’, the thousand-year-old city of Marrakesh is characterised by its pink-colored pisé architecture and its deeply rooted tradition for gardens and green spaces. The majority of historic sites are inextricable from their gardens – or indeed are historic green spaces: the huge royal orchard pleasure-gardens of the Agdal were described by Monty Don as ‘of international cultural importance on a par with Versailles or Villa d’Este’. Scores of traditional riads and hotels like the Mamounia, created by the French in 1923 on the site of an eighteenth-century royal residence, offer splendid gardens to the visitor. Yves Saint Laurent’s Majorelle garden is an icon of modern garden design. The first book to be published on this fascinating subject, Gardens of Marrakesh champions the city’s relevance today in a world of water scarcity and urban development and explores its green heritage, considering some twenty gardens both from an historic and cultural perspective.