Federation of Industries Building

Behind the Federation of Industries building is an ordinary stack of office floors. In front of it Rifat Chadirji hung what he called a flying wall: a free-standing brick screen of projecting balconies and vertical fins, held off the glass, reading from the street as a rhythm of arches and points, protrusions and voids. The device is borrowed from the traditional Baghdadi house, where the shaded outer layer does the environmental work; here it also hides the repetition of the plan and gives a speculative office block the weight of a public building. Chadirji built it in 1966, at the height of his practice Iraq Consult, and it remains the clearest surviving demonstration of what he meant by international regionalism: modern construction, regional shadow.