Hassan Fathy, the renowned Egyptian architect, was born into a wealthy family on March 23, 1900, in Alexandria. At the age of eight, he moved to Cairo with his family and settled in Helwan. His natural talent for drawing served him well when he later pursued architecture at King Fuad I University (now Cairo University), from which he graduated in 1926. He began his career as an engineer in the General Administration of Schools and later became an instructor at the Faculty of Fine Arts, where he remained until 1946. One of his most ambitious projects was the village of New Gourna, an architectural masterpiece that faced socio-economic challenges beyond his control. The project gained international recognition, receiving praise from British, Spanish, French, and Dutch publications between 1947 and 1949. Fathy held several prestigious positions, including Director of the Educational Buildings Department at the Ministry of Education and Head of the Architecture Department at Cairo University. However, his traditionalist vision clashed with the prevailing modernist trends, leading to his marginalization within the architectural community. In 1959, he briefly left Egypt to work for the Doxiadis Organization in Greece but returned to continue his work. Despite being overlooked by his peers, Fathy remained committed to his ideals, which he documented in his influential book Gourna: The Tale of Two Cities, later reissued in the West as Architecture for the Poor, a key text in architectural studies.