Oil + architecture

Abstract

Drilling of the deep-test oil well Dammam No. 7 began in Saudi Arabia in December 1936. In March 1938, at a depth of 1,440 metres it punctured the reservoir and began to produce a commercial quantity of crude oil. Geopolitical, entrepreneurial, financial, and exploratory events leading up to this momentous emanation from the desert are complex, but it was Standard Oil of California (SOCAL) that in 1933 gained a concession to explore for oil in the Kingdom. The Saudi King’s choice of SOCAL connected oil exploration and extraction directly to the west coast of America with its already well-established architectural culture of lightweight balloon framing and a burgeoning interest in the production of prefabricated, factory-made buildings, particularly houses. SOCAL and its successor company, Aramco parachuted these new-world building technologies, along with a simulacrum of Californian (sub)urbanism, into Saudi Arabian desert compounds to house expatriate oil workers. While initially viewed with deep suspicion and confined behind wire and gates, within a few decades, industrialised and prefabricated construction techniques had become the Saudi government’s standard method of delivering enormous numbers of affordable houses.