materia
As a pedagogical challenge, the designers had had to contextualize their
own design pretences to understand what this place needs and how they
could effectively build within a culturally nomadic landscape-- where
permanence is not a concept.
The site is nestled between four trees, which while small and sparse,
generally act as shaded meeting places for the community.
The project was birthed from a fundamental underlying need in the
region. It is a means to offer basic levels of hygiene, sanitation and
education while simultaneously situating a new civic infrastructure for
a dynamic and transforming community. Managed and maintained by
the Turkana community as well as the MCSPA, the pavilion reflects an
attitude of architecture as catalyst to interpersonal engagement and
interaction.
The design of the pavilion is motivated to elegantly resolve a condition of
severe environmental and technological constraints. Without the use of
computers and digital fabrication, the architecture works to implement
common materials in novel ways, and to make the most with the least.
The design utilizes generic scaffolding components, able to be sourced
around the globe, as the underlying structure able to be combined into a
unique and internally organized overall design. The strategy is to make a
custom and responsive architecture from a kit of common construction
parts which integrate forms and methods of vernacular Turkana
architecture.
As such, the design and construction are framed as a dialogue between
the students and the Turkana community. The pavilion was designed in
response to a contextual need, however, what emerged far exceeds the
basic functions of a shelter. It is a scaffold upon which all parties involved
gain a deeper understanding of an ‘other’, while at the same time turning
that critical lens upon themselves.
The construction schedule for the pavilion commenced in July 2015.
Groundwork, the foundation, and the slab were prepared, and then
two groups of students arrived in Kenya; the first to help introduce the
construction methods, and lay the framework for assembly, while the
second group arrived to complete construction.
The trees, due to their hierarchy over the site, played an important role
in the orientation of the pavilion, which seeks to maximize its shading
capacity by becoming an extension of the former.
The repurposing of these scaffolding clamps became an instrumental
component of the overall design, which capitalized on the flexibility of
these to make a system that can accommodate a high degree of tolerance.
The studio was based on a prototyping process that culminated in a real
scale mock-up of the pavilion being built by three students in a period of
a week. AD