Tunisia’s Landmarks Are Under Threat — and so Are the Architects Who Would Preserve Them

Tunisia’s Landmarks Are Under Threat — and so Are the Architects Who Would Preserve Them

In the heart of Tunis, the medina’s stone walls wrap around a dense knot of low buildings, historic houses and palaces stacked next to and on top of one another, cheek by jowl. Cobblestoned streets are lined with carved mashrabiya balconies and arched wooden gateways, details that gradually thin as you move outward, inching toward Avenue Habib Bourguiba. There, the city’s primary thoroughfare shifts into a markedly more European register. Palati…