Between the wars Casablanca's ville nouvelle went up in a hybrid the French called néo-mauresque: Art Deco massing and Parisian apartment planning crossed with carved plaster friezes, horseshoe openings and panels of glazed zellige set into lime-washed render. Marius Boyer's blocks gave the city its nickname, the White City.

The system reads the way those facades read. A chalky white ground, sun-flattened and matte. Black wrought iron drawing every rail, grille and letterform. Ornament held to bounded bands and inset panels — never wallpaper — with celadon tile, plaster warm and entrance-tile blue used as measured interruptions of the render.