Wind towers for passive evaporative cooling offer real opportunity for improving the ambient comfort conditions in building whilst reducing the energy consumption of air-conditioning systems. This study aims at assessing the thermal performance of a bioclimatic housing using wind towers realized in a hot dry region of Algeria. Performance monitoring and site measurement of the system provide data which assist model validation. The analysis and site measurement are encouraging, and they confirm the advantage of the application of this passive cooling strategies in hot dry climate. A mathematical model is developed using heat and mass transfer balances. For a more effective evaporative cooling, a number of improvements on wind tower configurations are proposed. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.