We drew the concept design from the previous sketchy step to scale, which had a very 'interesting' outcome as you can see.

We soon realized that we simply don't have enough program to fill the entire site but also that the large number of classrooms needs more then only three buildings. However on the whole we are pretty satisfied with this first concept and decide to proceed from here. The overall layout locks the site well into the surrounding, the sequence of buildings works well and the addition of program fits well. We might actually try to find a bit more program to fill the site.
Another thing we need to do is work on a more site-specific classroom.

The classroom is the thing we focused on today. We want to make a building with a secured area for possible computers and other items with a high risk of theft, other requirements are the possibility to join a number of classrooms in one building while at the same making the best use of the amount of space we have. We have to consider the fact that the site is sloping, without knowing how much that slope is. And finally we aimed to make a model building to serve as an example for all following buildings.

The classroom is 6 x 8 m. By interlocking two classrooms there is space to create a shared secured area. We try a range of configurations and finally came up with the following design.




And with this new building design we sketched the revised layout.



We will meet the trustees of Ahead next week and present them our work so far. It will be interesting to see if we met their expectations.

Draft masterplan

Weeks of reading, discussing and asking questions have gone by, but it's finally time for the fun stuff...
after the first stage of trying to understand the location, brief and conditions in Ethiopia, it's time to actually do what we are supposed to do: design. Unfortunately this doesn't mean we know all there is to know, it just means that we have to move on. We still need to learn a lot, but we will rely on the effectiveness of trial and error during the design process and luckily enough we'll still have a lot of support from experts in different fields who will surely let us know about our possible ignorance.

So let's get on with the design.
Two weeks ago we made the first sketches of the masterplan.



The area is divided by a path running from north to south. This path forms the connection with the recreation ground on the north side and it gives the opportunity to allocate the program to different areas: the east side has the public functions, while the educational buildings are placed on the quieter, more secluded west side of the path.
The campus is entered from the north, via the public square with a cafe and room for a little market. The parking and drop off areas will also be there.
After crossing this square you will find the reception and administration offices, as well as the library. The library will also be accessible for the children from neighbouring secondary school.
The administration offices and library are bordering another smaller square, where the central path runs through to continue on the other side leading to the visitors' dormitory.

The west of the little square has a view over the classrooms. A path runs from the square and is flanked by the learning garden on one side and clusters of classrooms on the other.
The classrooms are placed in the central area of the plot, to give them the most peace and quiet. By clustering them, classrooms can be added in different stages, beginning with an small number of classrooms (three of four), but hopefully soon growing to the expected forty classrooms.

The remaining of the plot will be filled with the recreation area and plots for agriculture, both for the students as for renting.

The next step will be to draw this plan to scale and go into more detail about the classroom clusters.

sketching

Another cold and windy London evening, another (very nice) architecture office and an abundant supplies of cookies….it’s a tough job!
Tonight was a smaller group then last time, so after going through our findings we could even have a go at some first sketches.

Matt came with some great books:
Koenigsberger. O.H. et al. (1973) - Manual of Tropical Housing and Building: Part 1 Climatic Design, Longman, London, UK
Roland Stulz and Kiran Mukerji (1993) - Appropriate Building Materials: A catalogue of potential solutions (Third Revised Edition). ITDG Publishing
Paul Oliver (ed.) - The Encyclopedia of Vernacular Architecture of the World, Cambridge University Press
and a load of information such as the right window percentage (20%), building on the east-west axis, no openings on the west side, a outside space on the north in wintertime and on the shaded south side in the summer, a rainfall of 800 mm. (London has an annual rainfall of 750 mm.) and the fact that the sun is much stronger at this latitude.

The main design issues at this stage were the need to locate the security guard next to the lockable computer room and to the car park.
As for the layout, we came up with the idea to incorporate an amphitheatre and a café.
We made some sketches, which all lead to the idea of dividing the large area into smaller sections: a road as a spine through the middle of the plot, on one side a café that would also be connected to the public area on the north side of the schoolsite. On the other side of the road would be the classrooms, and more to the south the library. This library would be in the quietest area and near to the existing secondary school.

As for the architecture; we are thinking about a small structure, to initiate the first three classrooms, with the prospect of replicating this configuration in the future as the school gets larger.

A lot of enthousiasts!

Today was a very busy meeting. Not only was our own group complete, but Engida brought a colleague along and Elfneh from Ahead attended this meeting as well.
This meant a lot of talking about the exact brief and the location in Ethiopia.
For most of us Ethiopia was not much more than another country in Africa. But when you’re designing a school you better find out everything you need to know about the exact location and the limitations and possibilities for the design.

Shakiso is a town with a population of about 3,000 people. There is one secondary school and several primary schools. The distance to Addis Ababa (the capital of Ethiopia) is about 500 km. but the nearest tarmac road is not nearer than 200 km. from Shakiso, final stretch of the road to the town is a gravel road. At 100 km. are two other larger towns. These facts have a great influence on the use of materials for the school. Most likely we will be confined to concrete blocks and corrugated steel roofs.

Ahead has been given the opportunity to use a large site for the new school. We can put our initial three classrooms on a sloping plot of 300 x 400 m. On the east side of this plot is the secondary school, and it would be a good idea to share some of our facilities with that school.
The site is located at the edge of the town, without public transport to it.
One of the ideas would be to provide local street children with horses and carts to get means of transport to the school.
The area around the school should be secured and we should be aware of termites, mosquitoes and monkeys!

Other local conditions that we, European based, architects need to be aware of are floods, although it doesn’t rain much, when it rains it pours. The rainy season is in the spring and summer months (February till June and July till September). During those seasons the wind is from east to west, and in the dry season from north to south.
When it’s dry the days are hot and the nights are cold, in the rainy season the temperatures tend to be more modest.

The school will start as a small project with a minimal of three classrooms. But the ambitions are much larger. Being a school for adult learning, it would be great to use the actual building process as a learning experience. When the school is running, it should soon start getting larger, with more classes to be taught. Around the school can be a vegetable garden and some livestock, as part of the classes.
Also, this school can become an example project for other similar schools.

We concluded the evening with again another list of questions, we need to know much more about the location (so anyone who could help us with information about Shakiso, or even better, anyone in that area, please contact us at info@afhuk.org), and in the next weeks we will try to find out about the climate, vernacular architecture, sanitary provisions, solar panels and rainwater storage.

Background

How to design a school in Ethiopia

Well, we started with the following brief:
3 classroom school in Shakiso, Southern Ethiopia, to be a landmark, a beacon, somewhere where the community wish to go and meet. To be developed further in the future. To be as sustainable as possible, probably using concrete blocks and corrugated iron roofing.

We received a list of requirements [3 classrooms, library, learning centre, workshop, café, staff room, security guard room, cleaner’s room and several offices] a very rough site plan and some pictures. Unfortunately the site plan wasn’t exactly up to Ordnance Survey standards, but more like a copy from a copy from a… and the pictures of the site were taken from different angles, but lacked information about their location. But we had something to start with: doing a lot of research to find out what we would be working on in the next months.

First meeting

At our first meeting we discussed the lack of information and decided that before doing any designing, we should spend time on getting much more information.
This led to maps from Google Earth, a more specified brief with attention to the way of building, the kind of materials we can use and some reference images from other schools build in Africa. We discussed the use of solar panels, the difficulties with tin roofs (too hot and too noisy) and the possibilities of concrete blocks and corrugated iron.
And we ended the evening by dividing all the research we will have to do. It seems like research will be the keyword for the next weeks.

Ethiopia on Google Earth

Shakiso on Google Earth

First meeting

The project has started, we've had our first meeting!

In the next couple of months a group of volunteers from different backgrounds will work together to design a school in Ethiopia. Architects, engineers and landscape architects from London are working together for Architecture for Humanity to design this school for Ahead. I will try to keep a regular blog to tell you about this exciting project and show you what we are doing.