Al-Muizz street holds the greatest concentration of medieval Islamic architecture anywhere.
Al-Muizz li-Din Allah street runs a kilometre through the medieval city and carries mosques, madrasas, mausolea, caravanserais and public fountains from the tenth century to the nineteenth, side by side and mostly still in use.
Start at Bab al-Futuh, one of the Fatimid gates, and walk south. The mosque of Al-Hakim, the Qalawun complex with its hospital, madrasa and tomb, the Barquq mosque, and Bayt al-Suhaymi — a merchant's house of 1648 with a courtyard, mashrabiya screens and a cool that makes the point about pre-modern architecture better than any explanation.
The Al-Azhar mosque, founded in 970, sits just off the route and its university is among the oldest continuously operating in the world. Further south, Sultan Hassan is the one that stops people: a fourteenth-century madrasa on a scale closer to a cathedral, with a courtyard you can hear your own footsteps in.
Further south, Sultan Hassan is the one that stops people: a fourteenth-century madrasa on a scale closer to a cathedral, with a courtyard you can hear your own footsteps in.
Practicalities: shoulders and knees covered, shoes off in the mosques, and go late afternoon. The street is pedestrianised, lit at night, and the temperature difference between two o'clock and five is the difference between endurance and pleasure.
