Light and housing in the desert: Case study of Ghardaia, Algeria

Two field studies were carried out in the city of Ghardaia, in Southern Algeria, to investigate the influence of light and temperature on the use of residential houses. The investigation included both traditional and 'modern' houses in order to compare them, the modern having relatively large windows similar to those of the northern part of Algeria, the traditional ones having small or no windows. The resuls of the lighting studies are presented as follows. A typical traditional house is described as it was observed including a description of the various spaces. Then the recorded light values are presented and commented on. In the second part three types of modem houses observed in the field studies are presented and compared with the traditional archetype. The comparison especially dwells on the relative effectiveness of the two systems of daylighting. In the third part the results of interviews with the inhabitants are presented, focusing on various issues of lighting. The results of the lighting study indicate that the use of more windows in modern houses is a true improvement of lighting rather than a fashion. The lighting in the traditional houses is not adequate, especially for activities such as reading and using modem kitchen equipment. Only the courtyard receives enough daylight, but it is not uniformly distributed and the activities are therefore located according to their visual demands. The daylighting in modem houses, on the other hand, allows a larger number of activities to take place in different spaces.