Is Morocco good for architecture enthusiasts?

Architecture enthusiasts find Morocco almost overwhelming in the best way, because the building traditions are varied, intact and still inhabited. I usually begin with the courtyard logic that runs through everything: the riad, an inward-facing house wrapped around a planted patio and fountain, where blank exterior walls hide astonishing interiors of zellige, carved plaster and cedar. Understanding the riad unlocks how Moroccans have organised domestic and religious space for a thousand years.

The religious and scholarly buildings are the showpieces. The Marinid madrasas of Fes — Bou Inania and al-Attarine — are jewel boxes of mosaic and carved stucco, while the Koutoubia in Marrakech and the Hassan Tower in Rabat show the soaring Almohad minaret style that influenced Seville's Giralda. In Casablanca the modern Hassan II Mosque, rising on a platform over the Atlantic with one of the tallest minarets in the world, proves the tradition is still evolving at monumental scale.

Then the architecture changes character entirely as you head south. The kasbahs and ksour — fortified earthen structures of rammed earth and adobe, crowned with crenellations and geometric relief — are a different aesthetic altogether, sculpted from the land they stand on. Aït Benhaddou is the famous example, but the whole Dades and Draa region is an open-air museum of pisé construction, including the Glaoui kasbah at Telouet, whose crumbling grandeur I find unforgettable.

A practical tip for design-minded travellers: stay in the architecture rather than just visiting it. Sleeping in a restored riad in Fes or Marrakech, or a converted kasbah in the south, teaches you more about proportion, light and climate-control than any tour. Pair the imperial cities for refined urban architecture with the southern route for earthen vernacular, bring a wide lens for the courtyards, and let me arrange access to a few private riads that are not normally open to the public.