Openings and Their Impact on the Visual Aspects of House Facades in Mosul City

This paper discusses one of the most distinctive issues of architecture debates about visual aspect (privacy) in architecture. It aims to measure the impact the openings of house facade on visual aspect (privacy)y in Mosul City. The objectives of this research attempt to examine the correlation between the openings of house facade and its achievement of visual privacy. the study investigates a conceptual model for opening of facade and formulates the properties of visual aspect. The study adopted a qualitative survey. Sample selection for qualitative survey uses the stratified method to select the samples in this study. A group of houses were selected within four time periods in the city of Mosul. For qualitative analysis, the methods used rely on direct observation and visual documentation. This analysis deals with configuration differences of the house facade. Findings from the results of this analysis support the research assumption that size of openings in the house facade have direct impacts on achieving visual privacy. The study makes an important contribution to address the dialectical relationship between the openings and visual aspect ( privacy) by ending the conflicting theoretical approaches regarding the impact of openings on visual privacy.