Clarke - A House in Fez: Building a Life in the Ancient Heart of Morocco

ABOVE LEFT A view over the Fez Medina, with the green-tiled roof of the Karaouiyine Mosque in the foreground

ABOVE RIGHT The downstairs salon on the day we purchased the home

BELOW The moment of sale: the previous owners of the house accept the cash

ABOVE LEFT Looking through the Bab Bou Jeloud into the Medina

ABOVE RIGHT A cat makes itself at home outside a shop in the Medina

BELOW The dye vats at the Chouwara tanneries

TOP One of Fezs last surviving brocade makers

MIDDLE Our neighbors children making the most of the daily donkey deliveries

LAST The courtyard, for many months our living room, was in constant chaos

TOP Having lunch with Si Mohamed

MIDDLE The decapo ladies, Fatima and Halima, whose work revealed the beauty of the cedar beneath up to seven layers of paint

LAST The first of many deliveries of lime and sand that were to continue for months

LEFT Offerings being taken to the saints shrine during the Festival of Moulay Idriss

ABOVE Genghis the chameleon in the orange tree

BELOW The kitchen stripped bare. The outline of the old window shows where it once joined the house next door

ABOVE Putting zellij on the kitchen floor

ABOVE Tigger with the date basket we discovered behind a false wall

BELOW The kitchen, finished at last

ABOVE A whirling dervish from Syria performs during the Fez Festival of World Sacred Music

BELOW left A late-niaght Sufi performance during the Fez Festival of World Sacred Music

BELOW right After months of work, the courtyard is finally complete

ABOVE The finished downstairs salon. The door at the end leads to the main bathroom, the door on the right to the courtyard

BELOW LEFT The upstairs salon, two weeks before guests were due

BELOW TOP RIGHT The same salon, completed at midnight the day before the guests arrived

BELOW LOWER RIGHT The wonderful Riad Zany workers, clockwise from bottom left: Abdul Kader, Si Mohamed, Mustapha, Mernissi, Abdul Ramin, Si Mohamed Two, Fatima, Halima, Noureddine

The names of some people in the text have been changed to protect their privacy.

SUZANNA CLARKE

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Copyright 2007 by Suzanna Clarke

Photographs copyright 2007 by Suzanna Clarke,
with the exception of page 4 (top) of photo insert
copyright Sandy McCutcheon

Originally published in Australia in 2007 by the Penguin Group (Australia)
Published by arrangement with the Penguin Group (Australia)

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