Senegal: Nka Foundation Announces the Winners of 5th Earth Architecture Competition

DIAKOUNDA, Senegal - Nov. 12, 2017 - PRLog -- The 1^st prize winning entry is COMMUNITY LIBRARY by Vitor Breder, Nayanne Guerra, Mário Soares and Yuka Perdigão Ogawa in Brazil; the 2^nd prize goes toHYGIENE SPACE by Jérôme Gruwé in France; and the 3^rd prize is awarded toCOLLAGEby Brittany Hill and Caitlin McDonnell in Australia. Honorable Mention is awarded to the following entries: 4^th place NKA FORUM by Alberto Cumerlato and Tiago Sa in Portugal; 5^th  placeA CLASSROOM by Aida Zaremohazzabieh in Iran; 6^th place TERANGA KITCHEN byGreg DiRienzo, Jordan Frazin, and Justin Pingin in USA,and 7^th place CHAOS THEORY byPriyanka Ravi and Priyanka Ulaganathan in India.

The selection jury consists of Adrià Clapés i NICOLAU, director of IsArch in Spain; Adrian WELCH, architect and founder of E-architect in the UK; Juliet SAKYI-ANSAH, architect at a UK firm and director at The Architects' Project; Jurriaan van STIGT, architect at LEVS Architecten, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Podjamas CHAISURAPHAWAT, urban planner at Progress Consultant and self-employed architect in Thailand; Sarah LAISNEY, architecture and planning adviser at Cuso International in Honduras; and Stephan Jörchel, a civil engineer with Dachverband Lehm e.V. at Weimar in Germany. The jurors used judging criteria involving form, function and technical issues toevaluate all entries in the contest. The jurors awarded prizes for first, second and third place consisting of a commemorative certificate and the following options: 1st prize - $1,000 or construction of design in Senegal plus a trip to Senegal for a workshop to build the winning design; 2nd prize- Construction or $700 and 3rd prize- Construction or $400. Every design team that made the Top 40 Entries shortlist is offered the opportunity to build their design in Senegal in collaboration with the project organizers.

Through the 5^th Earth Architecture Competition, Nka Foundation issued a challenge to professionals and students of architecture, design, urban planning and others from around the world. The challenge was to design a modern mud type to be built as a unit of an artisanal village, a residential vocational training center for unemployed rural youths of ages 16 to 25 years to undergo a 2-year skills development training in the vocational arts and design in the Diakounda village in Sédhiou Region of the Casamance in Senegal.The contestant was to design one of the following school types: a classroom, cafeteria, office building, dormitory, group toilet, dwelling type for the local teachers, and guest house type for our international visiting staff. The competition organizer wanted the designs to emphasize cost efficient construction and sustainable architecture by fully integrate earth architecture and passive solar design. In light of these, the competing teams were to design their school types for construction by maximum use of earth and local labor. Total cost of constructing the design entry was not to exceed $10,000 (USD) for materials and labor.

WHAT IS NEXT?
As the construction of the best design entries is our priority, every design team that made the Top 40 Entries shortlist is offered the opportunity to build their design in Senegal in collaboration with Nka Foundation. The construction site will be the Diakounda Arts Village in the Casamance in Senegal. The building workshops to realize the Top 40 Design Entries will run from February 2018 to July 2020 and will be posted on http://nkaprojects.boards.net  Each workshop will run for about 12 weeks. For example, the construction workshop to build the 2^nd prize winning design,  HYGIENE SPACE by Jérôme Gruwé in France, will be held from June 20^th to September 20^th 2018.

Through an open call for volunteers, each workshop will bring together professionals and students of architecture, landscape architecture, design, engineering, urban planning, the arts and others from around the world to join the workshop and play a part in line with their expertise. Join us to create change where it is most needed. The arts village will be a residential skills learning center of a self-sustaining type for replication in other parts of Africa.  The arts village is conceived as an informal school, an artisanal vocational development center that brings together international workshop participants, local artisans and less privileged youths from the region for skills transfer. The training will be provided by resident teachers and by hosting guest projects by both international and local practitioners in a self-growing school complex. That means, in the beginning there are just a few buildings. After the students have learnt some construction techniques, they will test their acquired knowledge and skills by building the next part of the school or some functional buildings for the community. Thus, the students are challenged to solve real problems, work together, to learn and build and create.

To participate, contact us at info@nkafoundation.org / www.nkafoundation.org .