My dizzying 72 hours in Albania’s architectural hotbed, where I toured odd buildings, hugged an embattled prime minister, and wondered who would buy a condo in a nose

“I’ll try to focus on this, which is not the easiest thing today,” says Edi Rama, the embattled prime minister of Albania, after a night spent monitoring violent protests in the capital, Tirana. But Rama quickly warms to one of his favorite subjects. “Architecture,” he says, choosing his words carefully, “has the power to change societies. It’s like a strong medicine. It can heal, or it can kill.”

Albania’s Prime Minister Edi Rama

Photo: Fred A. Bernstein

As a journalist who covers architecture, I had been hearing about a building boom in Albania for several years. It seemed like half the architects I knew in New York were on a first-name basis with the prime minister, a working artist and, at six-foot-seven, a former pro basketball player.…