Azza Aboualam

Azza Aboualam is an Emirati architect based in Sharjah who works in architecture, installation and research. Her subjects are food grown in dry climates, and memory, society and architecture across the Middle East and North Africa. Her installations are greenhouse assemblies designed for arid conditions. They draw on archival research and fieldwork on the places where food is grown in the UAE.

Library Circles (2024) was a research display of architectural drawings and photographs of spiritual spaces in Islam, in Sharjah and New York. Pressure Cooker (2025) studied food production and architecture in the UAE and proposed a series of greenhouse assemblies. Assemblies (2026) builds on it as an imagined greenhouse system for food and self-sufficiency on dry land.

Aboualam studied interior design at the American University of Sharjah and took a Master of Architecture at Yale University. She taught at Zayed University, Dubai, and in 2021 co-founded Holesum Studio, working between New York and Sharjah. Library Circles was shown at the Jameel Library, Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai (2024). In 2025 she curated Pressure Cooker, the National Pavilion UAE exhibition at La Biennale di Venezia's 19th International Architecture Exhibition. She was the first Emirati woman to curate the pavilion. Pressure Cooker was also shown at Dubai Design Week (2025). Assemblies is part of the third Sharjah Architecture Triennial (2026).