Taghazout Resort

Location: Taghazout, Morocco

Scope: Master planning and landscape design guidelines

Size: 600 hectares

Program: 24 hotels, 5 golf courses, residential (villas, condos, apartments), commercial/retail, cultural village, nature preserve

Description: Following his Majesty King Mohammed the VI's proclamation in 2000 to dramatically boost tourism in Morocco over the next 10 years, GCH was selected to lead the land planning portion of the Taghazout project for an international team of experts. The project, which encompassed over 600 hectares of area, would become the first of seven mega-tourism projects to be pursued by Morocco’s Ministry of Tourism. Master planning and design concepts focused around maintaining and integrating the local and regional Berber character into the project to emphasize the unique “sense of place” of Taghazout and this region of Morocco. Preserving and establishing extensive renaturalized native areas for the protected Aganier Tree and appropriate habitat for the protected bird, the Ibis Chauve, became integral to the project design. Preliminary water resource studies were provided to study the availability and responsible useage of ground water and sea water into the project. Native and drought tolerant plant materials were utilized to both minimize water useage while keeping in character with the region.