Monday's eye on Tangier-Le coup d'oeil du lundi sur Tanger

The blond softness of brick and stucco arches in Marrakesh. The benefit of shade on a hot day.

La douceur blonde de la brique des arcades à Marrakesh. Les bienfaits de l'ombre par une journée torride.

Image: Joelle Desparmet

Colours and patterns of Morocco (pink Marrakech)

In Morocco, the predominant colour of a city is its signature: Tangier is a white city because most houses are painted with lye. Chefchaouen, the blue city, is painted with a mixture of indigo and lye in water; Fez is mostly ocher coloured and Marrakesh is orangy pink because the reddish clay found in that area is mixed with straw to make pisé, a sort of adobe used in outer walls of houses and in the making of bricks. 

That may be why many buildings are painted in reddish pink even when not made of pisé.

A striped rosy wall, a painter's interpretation of the horizontal rows of dark brick/light mortar walls typical of the Marrakech area.

A pale celadon door in a soft pink wall that has seen better days.

Pink facades along a narrow alley in the medina.

A beige pink softens the starkness of a dead-end.

A medieval looking workshop front in faded pink in the medina.

A downward view into a tiled Riad housing the Museum of Photography .

The pastel minaret from the upper terrace of Riad Awa, a lovely guest house on the edge of the medina where we stay when in Marrakech.

Images: Joelle Desparmet, Pinterest