Asmara is the world’s outstanding living museum of classical modernist architecture comprising a whole city with all its urban functions: housing, industries, services and administration, shopping, leisure, culture and recreation. Most of the architectural language is architettura razionale, the Italian modernism of the 1920s and 30s. However, there are also numerous examples of novecento, futurismo, neoclassicism, neo--‐baroque, monumentalism, as well as buildings with links to local Eritrean architecture. No other city in the world can be proud of such a comprehensive ensemble of classical modernist architecture.