Shaymaa Al-Baker - VCUarts Qatar Showcase

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Shaymaa Al-Baker

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New Graphic Languages Inspired by Qatari Gates

From the 1950s to the 1960s, gates in Qatar were highly ornamental and stood as visual markers of identity and craftsmanship; they were often the most detailed and significant element of a home’s facade. As contemporary architecture has shifted toward minimalism, many of these distinctive designs have disappeared.

This thesis revisits historic palace and residential gates as a source for visual, textural, and compositional exploration. Drawing on archival and photographic documentation, the project extracts decorative motifs and structural details, translating them into refined vector illustrations. These elements are developed into a modular visual system inspired by relief printmaking, where forms are layered and repeated to generate new gate configurations.

The outcome includes a series of reinterpreted gate compositions and a publication documenting the process.

Process publication documenting the collected gates and their transformations

Shaymaa Al-Baker

Graphic Design 2026

From the 1950s to the 1960s, gates in Qatar were highly ornamental and stood as visual markers of identity and craftsmanship; they were often the most detailed and significant element of a home’s facade. As contemporary architecture has shifted toward minimalism, many of these distinctive designs have disappeared.

This thesis revisits historic palace and residential gates as a source for visual, textural, and compositional exploration. Drawing on archival and photographic documentation, the project extracts decorative motifs and structural details, translating them into refined vector illustrations. These elements are developed into a modular visual system inspired by relief printmaking, where forms are layered and repeated to generate new gate configurations.

The outcome includes a series of reinterpreted gate compositions and a publication documenting the process.

Tags

Architectural
Experimental

Elements of Entry

New Graphic Languages Inspired by Qatari Gates

Shaymaa Al-Baker

Graphic Design 2026

Tags

Architectural
Experimental

From the 1950s to the 1960s, gates in Qatar were highly ornamental and stood as visual markers of identity and craftsmanship; they were often the most detailed and significant element of a home’s facade. As contemporary architecture has shifted toward minimalism, many of these distinctive designs have disappeared.

This thesis revisits historic palace and residential gates as a source for visual, textural, and compositional exploration. Drawing on archival and photographic documentation, the project extracts decorative motifs and structural details, translating them into refined vector illustrations. These elements are developed into a modular visual system inspired by relief printmaking, where forms are layered and repeated to generate new gate configurations.

The outcome includes a series of reinterpreted gate compositions and a publication documenting the process.

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