Casablanca

Casablanca, 20th century city, crossroads of influences focuses on the products of urban planning and architecture in Morocco’s largest city from the period between 1920 and 1975. It is “a fusion of African culture (more precisely North African culture), European culture and American culture”. Where Rabat leans more towards the neo-Moorish styles of the early 20th century French, in Casablanca the modern movement in architecture and other avant-garde trends such as art deco and brutalism, and urban planning principles such as housing projects were applied. After the French bombarded this port city in 1907, it had almost to be rebuilt from scratch. Therefore, the proposal compares Casablanca with the planned 20th-century cities of Brasilia (Brazil) and Chandigarh (India).

I spent a late afternoon in the city center of Casablanca looking for this 20th-century heritage. No specific buildings are named in the Tentative Site description provided by Morocco. Given the scope as described above, it is unsure whether the Hassan II Mosque (of a later date, 1993) is part of it. I relied mostly on Wiki’s Architecture of Casablanca for suggestions and checked out several buildings on foot. The first one was the Central Post Office, a not-too-noticeable construction in what looks like a mix of Neo-Moorish and Art Nouveau. It lies at Mohammed V square, together with a few more buildings from the same era in a similar style such as the Bank Al-Maghrib and the Wilaya Building.  

From that square, I walked southward to the Liberty Building …

I visited this tentative WHS in April 2018. In my opinion, the French-colonial design still present in Casablanca is not of OUV and would definitely not contribute anything which is missing from the WH list.

On the other hand, Casablanca is a pleasant stopover between the two WHS of El Jadida and Rabat but mostly to appreciate the impressive Hassan II Mosque (photo) by the Atlantic Coast. 

I visited Morocco in December 2010, and ended my trip in Casablanca, where I stayed at Hôtel Maamoura, one of the city's many Mauresque (a blend of French-colonial design and traditional Moroccan style) buildings. The best meals in Casablanca were the fresh oysters from the stalls in the Central Market and Rick's Cafe, touristy but very well done (and where I was able to rewatch Casablanca, whose final five minutes are among the best in movie history) (www.rickscafe.ma/). I ended my trip to Morocco with a visit to Hassan II Mosque.