From Jdeideh to the souk: four stops on foot in Aleppo

Jdeideh is the quarter Aleppo built outside its walls, and it has been the centre of this side of the city since the fifteenth century. This walk starts on its square and drops south, into the walled city: 2000 metres in all, four stops. Everything you see says the same thing — in Aleppo, wealth faces the courtyard and not the street. All four doors are narrow. The courtyards behind them are not.

The route

Start at Sahat al-Hatab. The square is paved in stone, 2500 square metres, with a round stone bench running around the foot of the tree in the middle. Leave the square to the north, into al-Kayali lane: Beit Ghazaleh is 250 metres on, three minutes, on the right. The wooden oriels on the facade opposite are a good marker; the door of the house itself is the narrow arch between two lamps. Then turn south and cross into the walled city: Beit Junblatt is 780 metres on, ten minutes, in the narrow lanes of Farafra. There is no sign, and finding the last hundred metres by asking is normal. From there carry on south: Khan al-Wazir is 960 metres on, twelve minutes, on the east side of the Madina souk.

Timing

Be on the square at 09:00. The shops are just opening in the morning and the facades around it take the light head-on; forty-five minutes is enough. At 10:00 you are at the door of Beit Ghazaleh. The north face of the main courtyard is carved from top to bottom, and that carving flattens out in overhead light — which is the reason for coming in the morning. Walk south at 10:45. Half an hour at Beit Junblatt: the pool in the courtyard, the huge iwan facing it, and the surfaces where the iwan’s tiles were stripped away. At 11:30 you are at the portal of Khan al-Wazir. The souk is busy around midday, and it is one step from the khan into it.

Take care

At three of the four stops the door is not open every day. Repairs are still going on at Beit Ghazaleh and whether you can go inside changes, Beit Junblatt needs permission, and work continues inside Khan al-Wazir — for the last one, ask the traders. Tunnels blown under the square in 2015 destroyed the buildings around it; the paving was renewed in repairs that began in 2021, but empty facades still stand next to restored ones and some lanes can be closed. There is no signage; asking a resident is normal here and it works. The lanes are narrow and the ground is stone and broken in places. Jdeideh is a lived-in quarter: do not enter courtyards uninvited, and ask before photographing doorways.