An Approach to an "Authentic Lebanese Architecture"

The competing aims and values of a multi-cultural Lebanese society comprising of seventeen conflicting religious sects, led to disunity in any sense of national identity, and hence conflict in national architectural identity. This resulted in a polluted and biased canon of authentic "Leba-nese architecture" which presented this concept as dialectic and controversial between the con-flicting groups. Authentic architecture is the socio-cultural interaction that is focussed on the creation of a local identity (Niskasaari, 2008) that reflects social norms, values and beliefs. This paper inves-tigates if, despite a polluted canon, authenticity exists in Lebanese architectural styles. It will present an approach to define a new canon of authentic "Lebanese architecture" by investigating the opinions of the marginal cultures, as opposed to the views of the associate professions, in order to consider an unpoliticized view of architectural identity and to achieve an agreeable Le-banese style which may be sustained for future generations.