A century of architecture in the Arabian Peninsula : evolving Isms and multiple architectural identities in a growing region

This article presents a positional interpretation and highlights the issues of identity, tradition, and modernity by critically outlining a number of voices that represent selected architectural interventions in the Arabian Peninsula. Through a reading of projects that emerged over a century from 1914 to 2014, an articulation is made to place such a reading into focus by classifying different trends under three economic eras: pre-oil, oil, and post-oil. The analysis manifests a continuous struggle to absorb modernity and construct identity and concludes with a number of questions regarding challenges facing architecture and future developments in the region