Clock Tower and Medina Gate, Casablanca

After serving in Algeria, where he supervised the construction of a clock tower, the French officer and engineer Charles Martial Joseph Dessigny was assigned to Casablanca following the French military occupation of the city in 1907. One of his earliest and most symbolic projects in Casablanca was the construction of a clock tower at the edge of the old town. Built quickly and completed in 1909, the tower was intended to mark the entrance to the historic quarter while asserting a new administrative order.

The original Clock Tower deliberately echoed the form of a minaret. Square in plan and vertically emphatic, it rose above its surroundings with four clock faces marked in Roman numerals. This visual resemblance was not accidental. Positioned at the threshold between the European quarters and the medina, the tower signaled the arrival of French authority.

Over time, structural instability became an issue. By the mid-20th century, the tower was considered unsafe and was demolished in 1948. For decades, only photographs and memory preserved its image. In 1993, a replica of Dessigny’s tower was erected nearby, restoring the landmark to the urban landscape, though without its original political charge. Today, the replica Clock Tower stands at the northeastern edge of United Nations Square, beside the Old Medina Gate.

The nearby gate predates the colonial period and historically controlled access to the walled town, regulating the movement of people and goods between the port, the market streets, and the residential quarters inside. During the early French period, the gate was reshaped and visually emphasized. Today, small shops and informal stalls continue this long tradition of exchange.