Eritrea's 'secret' architecture: Modernist gems survive in Africa
AFP - September 5, 2007
With soaring concrete wings that mimic the shape of an airplane, the Fiat Tagliero garage built in 1938 in the Eritrean capital is one of the most unusual petrol stations in the world.
Architectural critics hail the filling station with its 18-metre (60-foot) concrete projections as one of the most remarkable surviving examples of the Futurist style.
But in Asmara, it is only one of many extraordinary structures.
Frustrated avant-garde architects from an architecturally conservative early 20th-century Europe used Asmara to experiment with radical new designs.
They left a legacy valued by Eritreans and by experts worldwide, but lesser known outside this little-visited country whose image is overshadowed by its 30-year liberation struggle from arch-foe Ethiopia.
"Visually, time seems to stand still here," said photographer Stefan Boness whose book "Asmara, The Frozen City," captures many of the city's architectural gems ...