A brown tiled open square, with solid concrete architecture drenched in brown and beige; the Talaat Harb Square is often deceptively quiet. Yet these very flagstones have felt the drumming of a hundred feet as demonstrators called for change throughout the past century. The Talaat Harb Square at a glance looks like an antiquity from the 50s that was only dabbed at by vague patches of modernity to alter its façade. The streets Talaat Harb and Abdel Salam Araf still loop around the copper personification of the Egyptian economist Talaat Harb, foot traffic much heavier than the whizzing of car motors. Initially known as Suleiman Pasha Street, its past history was wiped clean through a name change after a change in regimes. Names may have been altered but the French neoclassical architecture remained.

Moorish influences are found everywhere, evident in patterns permanently stamped onto the lampposts. Old establishments have stayed their ground, the streets lined with shops that were once household names internationally. Sip on a cup of French coffee by the square at Groppi which continues to offer a fusion of French pastries influenced by traditional Egyptian recipes. Sit by the Café Riche and you might just be taking up the same seat as the masterminds of the 1952 revolution. The Madbouli bookstore has grown much since its humble beginnings, as a street side collection of books tucked into a recess and can still be found within the square, the crinkling sound of paper a siren’s call to the travelling bookworm. The cement walls of these buildings are so much more than just shelter but a legacy left behind by a people that are constantly reinventing themselves.