We read the land before we draw.

Youssef El Saai is the founder of Scaliance Studio. A licensed landscape architect with a degree in urban infrastructure engineering from the École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS), he spent ten years on the Quebec and Canadian market, leading teams inside established design, planning and engineering firms.

He founded the studio to bring that experience to public and private clients in Canada, the United States, Egypt and the MENA region, from offices in Montréal and Cairo.

His dual training, in landscape architecture and in urban infrastructure engineering, shapes how the studio works. Every concept is tested from the first sketch against grading, drainage, accessibility and construction, so that what is drawn can be built and will last.

Over the years, delivering his own projects, he also worked closely with technical talent in Egypt and saw how much a team based in Cairo could bring. Today the studio works across both regions: from a heritage square in historic Cairo and a coastal masterplan in Marsa Alam to municipal parks, main streets and waterfronts in Quebec.

Every project begins as a landscape system, topography, water, climate, movement, memory and living structure, before it becomes a design object. Vision and delivery are never separate: every idea is tested against grading, hydrology, accessibility and construction, from the first reading to the built ground.