Between 1946 and 1952, New Gourna was built on a site located between the colossus of Memnon and Gezira on the Nile, at the level of the main road of the Theban Necropolis. It is a particularly striking example of urban planning associated with vernacular architecture. Hassan Fathy wanted to use local materials, and involve the villagers in the construction of their own houses. This was made in order to limit economic dependencies, ensure landscape continuity, architectural unicity and acceptance of the project in the communities. A cooperative system was put in place, and masons were trained among the villagers. The idea is to build houses at the lowest possible price, in order to make the village a test project for other communities in the country. Fathy borrowed from Nubian and Gourna architecture to create representative enclosed courtyards, vaulted roofing and chose to build in mud brick. He also reproduced the social and spatial organization of Old Gourna. The plan layout was designed to arrange one neigborhood unit to each of the five tribes living in the old village. A theater in adobe was also designed as a cultural center for the community. However Fathy had to give up the project after 3 years. The state disengaged and the Gourna experiment finally failed. When Hassan Fathy returns to the village in 1961, the village is as he left it, only the trees have grown. On the other hand, the 46 trained masons used the work learned in Gourna and now work throughout the region.
The experience of New Gourna has the merit of questioning many way of doing architecture. First of all on the participation in the construction of housing and the relevance of vernacular architecture in contemporary societies. But it also questions what makes the city, for Fathy it is mainly its inhabitants, its artisans, its communities. But on a larger scale, what makes a city is a sharing between the civilization that inhabits it and the cultural qualities of its spaces.