Every essay we've published, ordered by the editor — for return rather than for scrolling. Filter by topic, sort by length, find the piece you half-remember.
Downtown Beirut was not simply rebuilt badly after the war. It was rebuilt in a way that made later crises harder to absorb: vacancy became rational, repair became optional, ownership became distant, and the symbolic center of the capital lost the ordinary citizens who make cities heal.
Read essay ->Solidere's downtown offers the cleanest version of Lebanon's postwar bargain: privatize the wound, financialize the repair, and call the absence of public life reconstruction.
Beirut does not need another place to move through. Beirut needs a place to stay.
