Marrakesh Beyond Medina

For first-time visitors, the Medina of Marrakesh seemed to have anything one desired. From the grand palaces to the bustling market square, few visitors see reasons to explore the modern city beyond the city walls. For those who bother, it is most likely a cab ride straight to Jardin Majorelle, allegedly the most visited sight in the whole country. While it is understandable to overlook the modern side of Marrakesh, a visit to the “new city” provides a much-appreciated perspective on contemporary Morocco. After all, only a small fraction of the city’s residents live in the historic center.

It was not until our visit to Gueliz that I realized there is a bike share system in Marrakesh.

As mentioned in a previous post regarding my take on Marrakesh, I am not necessarily the biggest fan of Old Marrakesh for various reasons. After a day or two, we were both mentally and physically exhausted. It seemed like the only place we could decompress was back in our riad or high-end restaurants. While we thoroughly enjoyed our riad, I couldn’t help feeling restless after an hour or two. Judging from the prevailing opinions on the blogosphere, I can’t help wondering whether I am alone in this sentiment. I might be the only one eager to check out the rest of the city.

Jardin Majorelle

When we visited popular European cities, I would make an effort to make advanced reservations to notoriously popular attractions like Amsterdam’s Anne Frank House or Rom’s Borghese Gallery. For this trip, the only landmark that would warrant a reservation seems to be Jardin Majorelle. Located northwest of the Medina, the garden is said to be one of the most beautiful gardens in the world. With a towering reputation, most first-time visitors to Marrakesh felt obligated to check it out, even among those of us who don’t care for gardens under normal circumstances.

To my surprise, I could secure a late afternoon reservation for us about three days prior. The combination ticket costs 300 dirhams each, including the Pierre Bergé Museum of Berber Arts and the nearby Musée Yves Saint Laurent. Prices are high by Moroccan standards, but it doesn’t seem to deter any tourists. I honestly think the ticket price is just a method of crowd control. But on the other hand, it is painfully apparent that gawking visitors would still show up even if they double the ticket price.

Villa Oasis, the former private residence of Pierre Bergé and Yves Saint Laurent.

From Bab Moussoufa, Jardin Majorelle is about a 15-minute leisurely stroll through busy boulevards and roundabouts. The scene outside of the garden was maddening. At least two hundred tourists crowded around the entrance, and no one seemed to know the entry procedures. Even with timed reservations, the staff still instructed me to get to the back of a hundred-person queue. I protested and told him that my reservation would have expired by an hour by the time I got to the front of the line. After a short argument, he waved me in reluctantly. Considering how much they were charging, this was hardly the professionalism I would expect from the popular sight in a country.

Considering that there is a reservation system, we were shocked by just how packed the ground was. There were lines a giant line to take a picture at one of the popular photo spots. To manage the crowd, there were stagg stationed around directing human traffic. They would not hesitate to yell at you for not following the posted directions of the visit. It was far from being the tranquil walk in the garden we imagined. So what makes the Majorelle Garden so famous and so popular with tourists?

The two-acre garden was the work of Jacques Majorelle, a French painter and noted “Orientalist.” Like many other French artists of that era, Majorelle fell in love with the people and colors of Morocco. After extensive travel, he built his dig in Marrakesh and spent forty years developing a villa with an exotic garden. He hired a French architect, Paul Sinoir, to design a small Cubist villa. Majorelle first opened up his garden for the public in 1947 to cover the expense of the upkeep. Soon after his divorce, he was forced to sell the property. In the subsequent decades, the garden was forgotten.

In 1980, Pierre Bergé and Yves Saint Laurent rediscovered and purchased the garden. The couple spent considerable resources in restoring the property to its former glory. Thanks to their fashion empire, they spared no expense by employing two dozen full-time gardeners. Together, the team brought over three hundred plant species. Today's garden holds a large collection of cacti, palms, bamboo, garden plants, and aquatic plants. I could imagine anyone with green thumbs could linger around here for hours.

Who knew some symbol painting could produce such a marvelous effect?

Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé spent a lot of time in Marrakesh. Saint Laurent grew up in Algeria and found the familiarity of Marrakesh to be very comforting. The peace and seclusion of this place helped him to cope with the worst vices of the fashion industry: fame, alcoholism, and drug addiction. For him, the color of Morocco also provides great inspiration for this work. According to many of his close friends, Morocco was his favorite country.

“For many years, the Jardin Majorelle has provided me with an endless source of inspiration, and I have often dreamt of its unique colours.”

— Yves Saint Laurent

So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that when Saint Laurent passed away in 2008, Bergé decided to scatter his ashes in the rose garden of the Jardin Majorelle. On the ground is a short marble column dedicated to his memory. Though interesting, the design of the column left much to be desired. Since 2010, the garden has been owned and operated by the Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent. In response to the growing popularity of the garden, the foundation also opened up the nearby Villa Oasis, the private residence of Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berge.

The most iconic emblem of the Jardin Majorelle is the intense and vibrant blue color called Majorelle Blue. The color was formulated and trademarked by Jacques Majorelle in 1924. Allegedly, the color was inspired by all the blue Moroccan zellige tiles he saw in and around Marrakesh. Before our visit, I was skeptical about the outsized reputation of Majorelle Blue; it sounded like gimmicks if you ask me. But I must admit that in person, I was very impressed with the vibrancy and richness of the blue. Indeed, there is something mysterious about his proprietary paint formula.

The Majorelle Blue and the electric yellow.

Except for a few neon yellow vases and ochre-colored walls, just about everything else was covered with Majorelle Blue. The paint color looks particularly magical on the villa; it is also the one landmark that attracts the most visitors. The blocky villa would not be particularly striking without Majorelle Blue paint and the neo-Moroccan canopy out front. Even though visitors mobbed the villa, the interior is closed to visitors. I couldn’t even find a single picture of the inside online. Perhaps it is just a storage facility now?

Anyone who loves this blue color could pick up a can of officially certified Majorelle Blue from their gift shop. Because Majorelle Blue is legally patented, it is difficult to source it back home. But at 250 dirhams a pint, it is even pricier than luxury paints by Donald Kaufman. When I saw a gardener carrying a big bucket of Majorelle Blue doing touchups, I couldn’t help thinking that the retail value of that bucket of paint was probably more than the guy’s monthly paycheck.

Right next to the villa is Majorelle’s former painting studio. The Pierre Bergé Museum of Berber Arts. This small museum opened in 2011 under royal patronage, surveys North Africa’s Berber (or Amazighs) culture. King Mohammed VI’s mother Lalla Latifa was actually of Berber heritage. During his reign, the king elevated the importance of the Beber heritage in Morocco and made the Beber language one of the country's three official languages. Inside this museum, six hundred items collected by Bergé were displayed. And just like Bergé. Jacques Majorelle was also fascinated by the Berber culture and painted numerous schemes of Berber life.

While the exhibition inside was state-of-the-art, the overall experience was not particularly pleased with the shoulder-to-shoulder crowd inside. I found the whole museum to be quite suffocating, to be honest. Overall, the best way to summarize our visit to Jardin Majorelle was the unbearable overcrowding. Even putting that aside, we found the garden to be quite overrated. I suspect the historical connection with Yves Saint Laurent drives the garden’s popularity today. The wait time to get in could be as long as two hours for those without online reservations. It was to think this is Morocco's number one rated attraction.

Funny enough, our favorite part of the garden was their boutique shop. Their small collection of gifts is the most beautiful souvenir we came across on this trip. Since the Foundation Pierre Bergé also operated the boutique – Yves Saint Laurent, the design and quality of the items are superb. And because this was Marrakesh, the leather goods here are particularly high quality and a fraction of the price back home. The fixed prices also took away the stress of haggling.

Yves Saint Laurent Museum

For most visitors to Jardin Majorelle, there is an option to purchase combination tickets to the Yves Saint Laurent Museum next door. Inaugurated in 2017, the museum is dedicated to Saint Laurent’s career, and it was the last major project of Pierre Bergé’s before his death the same year. There is another Yves Saint Laurent Museum in Paris, so this one in Marrakesh aims to provide a Moroccan perspective of his career. The 43,000 sq. ft. building includes exhibition space, a research library, an archive, and a restaurant.

As the least fashionable person you could ever meet, I can’t say I am particularly interested in the exhibition. What drew me here was the museum’s architecture. It is arguably the country's most famous piece of contemporary architecture to date. Designed by French architectural duo Karl Fournier and Olivier Marty, the museum was both striking and understated. The intersection between cubical mass and curvilinear corners reflects the fashion designer's fascination with contrast.

What I like about the building the most is just how well it fits into the urban fabric of Marrakesh. The solid base and the windowless brick facade resemble the austere exterior of a riad. And just like a traditional riad, the simple exterior could be deceiving. Immediately upon entry, visitors arrived at a circular courtyard. The circular space is adorned only with spiral-patterned brickwork and a logo of Yves Saint Laurent. The space feels very melancholic and almost like a place of memorial. Based on my observation, this place seems like a place of pilgrimage for many fashionistas.

Considering the museum's popularity, we were surprised by just how small the exhibition space is. The small gallery is dedicated to temporary exhibitions. During our visit, the temporary exhibition was about the works of a French military cartographer, Théophile-Jean Delaye. In addition to map making, he also did extensive sketches and drawings of 18th-century Morocco. While the exhibition was interesting, I don’t quite see its connection with this museum or the fashion world.

The main exhibition hall itself is not that big. It brought together many of Saint Laurent’s iconic dresses and other materials, such as sketches and textiles. Saint Laurent’s design taste is comparably most restrained compared to exuberant couture designers like Alexander McQueen. Several dresses even look quite dowdy by modern standards. However, my favorite is the beaded dress fashioned after a painting by Vincent van Gogh. Since I am a novice in the fashion world, I could not attest to the caliber of the permanent exhibition. But it is my humble opinion that it is less interesting than some other fashion exhibits I have seen in the Metropolitan Museum of Arts over the years.

Besides the two exhibition halls, there is also an auditorium showing short films. Since we were not particularly interested in the subject, we skipped it without regret. Considering this is a fashion museum, their gift shop was not as interesting as you would imagine. Toward the end of our visit, I wondered how many visitors came here only because of the YSL branding. As much as I enjoyed the architecture, it is a place I would gladly skip if we ever returned to Marrakesh. But if you are already visiting Jardin Majorelle, stopping by for a quick look through the exhibits makes sense.

Gueliz & Ville Nouvelle

Although Marrakesh is often considered the best place to shop in Morocco, items in the souks tend to be very traditional and somewhat repetitive. For those of us who are inclined toward modern aesthetics, shopping at the souks could be a little bit of a crap shoot. Given Jardin Majorelle's popularity, quite a few interesting design boutiques cater to foreign visitors. While we did not buy anything, we quite enjoyed stopping by 33 Rue Majorelle and Chabi Chic Boutique to browse the works of the younger generation of Moroccan designers.

It was a 15-minute walk from the garden into Gueliz, Marrakesh’s preeminent modern district set up by the French colonists. As mentioned in my post on Casablanca, French colonialism in Morocco is quite a bit more nuanced and perhaps gentle than in places like Vietnam or Western Africa. By some accounts, French colonists, particularly Resident-General Hubert Lyautey, greatly appreciated Moroccan culture. There was no attempt to erase local culture and replace it with French customs. Rather, the French practiced the cultural/racial separation policy, setting up their own residential quarters outside of Medina.

Depending on your taste, Gueliz could either be unsightly dystopia or a glorious ode to Modernism.

Using the latest urban design principles, Gueliz was laid out with wide boulevards and radiated out from big roundabouts, just like in Paris. At first glance, the modern city is difficult to love. While stately Art Deco buildings are sprinkled around the neighborhood, the prevailing architectural style is decidedly modern. Ochre-colored concrete apartment buildings may not seem so beautiful today, but they were the trendiest building form at the time. Compared to the cramped lanes of Medina, each residential unit in Gueliz has plenty of daylight, balconies, and ventilation. Up until only a few decades ago, the neighborhood remained predominantly French.

I am quite a fan of the neo-Moroccan style.

Nowadays, Gueliz is thoroughly Moroccan, but there are traces of French influence everywhere you look. The most noticeable French feature is the abundance of roadside cafes. It seems like Moroccans are taking the cafe culture in stride. Since alcohol is generally not permissible in Islam, I found many practicing Muslims tend to substitute alcohol for caffeine. While mint tea is still the favored drink, a cup of French espresso also seems very popular at all hours. French pastry and pâtisserie are available for such affordable prices.

Despite its modest appearance, Gueliz is the trendiest part of Marrakesh. Hidden behind the drab modern facades are some of the most high-end restaurants in the city. By serendipity, we stopped at Le Petit Cornichon, a small restaurant by chef Erwann Lance. Lance worked in various Michelin-starred restaurants and was once a head chef at the ultra-luxury Hotel Royal Mansour. The nearly all-French clientele is a testament to French cookery's attention to detail and finesse. This place could hold the candle to many great brasseries in Paris. Brian’s plate of beautifully prepared steak frites is undoubtedly the best deal in years.

For most foreign visitors, a main draw in Gueliz would be the district’s numerous art galleries and boutiques. According to the guidebook, Comptoir des Mines Galerie is the most notable art gallery. This public gallery is housed in the headquarters of a mining corporation. The fully restored structure is an Art Deco gem. Although the building exterior is not remarkable, the restored interior was glorious. From terrazzo flooring to winding staircases, the museum offers another perspective of Morocco.

This museum was opened in 2016 and is the brainchild of Hicham Daoudi, a noted figure in the country’s art scenes. His museum aims to provide a forum for Morocco’s emerging artists. The museum also includes two off-site locations, all free to visit. The exhibition spaces in the main building are spread over three floors. I found the artwork here to be quite interesting. Scattering across the building are many art installations incorporated into the building. Going through the building was like a treasure hunt. The museum’s rooftop terrace is wonderful for a cup of coffee.

This post-modern building looks straight out of the Disney World.

No matter how your visit to Gueliz went, you will end up at the 16th November Square. As far as I could tell, this is the ground center of modern Marrakesh. Not only is this the main transport hub for the city, but it is also where all the international chains are located. The retail offerings from Zara to McDonald’s seem purposefully designed to satisfy foreign ex-pats. You might expect this place to be crawling with Westerners, but we hardly saw any other foreigners around during our visit. Marrakesh’s Medina may be an emblem of Morocco, but this new global Morocco is right here in Gueliz.

To cap off our visit to Gueliz, we stopped at the Theatre Royal at the district's edge. The construction of this theater began half a century ago and is designed to be the center of Morocco’s cultural life. Designed by Tunisian architect Charles Boccara, the theater synthesizes European and North African design. The most distinguished feature is a 1,200-seat outdoor amphitheater, which you can see from across the street. The construction took over three decades and was finally opened by King King Mohamed VI. But despite its promises, the theater seemed to struggle to take off. I can’t seem to figure out their program offerings.

MÉNARA GARDENS

Away from the chaos of the Medina, a massive formal garden seems to be plotted down in the middle of nowhere. Ménard Gardens is aligned with Bab al-Makhzen, the city's western gate, and has a perfect vista down the Koutoubia Mosque. The present iteration of the garden covers an area of about 250 acres and is dominated by a giant pool fed by an aqueduct and a historic pavilion. Surrounding the central pool is a vast and neatly arranged olive grove that resembles more of a corporate orchard in California’s Central Valley than a royal garden. The garden was commissioned in the 12th century by the Almohad dynasty to provide a reliable water source for the dry summer months. A few hundred years later, a stately pavilion was constructed to provide the sultan with a luxurious recreational area.

Though it is not nearly as popular as other spots in Medina, Ménara Gardens is still a mandatory stop for many on a guided tour. I suspect what makes this place so famous are all the beautiful photos of the pavilion with snow-capped High Atlas in the background. I must admit I was one of those who only visited to get that one cliche photo. You can imagine my disappointment when I realized the mountain range was obscured by air pollution (even on a sunny day). Without that picturesque backdrop, the garden was quite underwhelming. I could tell by the faces of the visitors that others felt the same.

Despite the garden’s size and fame, the whole complex was utilitarian. There was no public artwork or ornamental hedges. Instead, the walkways are lined with vendors and some park benches. So, if I was not too impressed with Ménara Gardens, why am I even including it on this list? Well, there is no admission charge, and it is a great way to get out of the city and get a new perspective on Marrakesh. If you have a choice, pick a day with a crystal-blue sky and good visibility. Because of the orientation of the pavilion, an afternoon visit will make your pictures more pleasing.

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Jardin Majorelle

Yves Saint Laurent Museum

Gueliz & Ville Nouvelle

MÉNARA GARDENS

The Palaces of Marrakesh

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