Alexandria Besharat
According to Design Like You Give a Damn, “one in seven people in the world are living a slum or refugee camp”. Sometimes these informal cities do not have access to clean water or proper sanitation. Some families live on less than two American dollars a day. (Architecture for Humanity 2006)
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| Image 1.1 Typlical home in Khayelitsha South Africa Source: Brenda Nkuna/WCN http://westcapenews.com/?p=776.jpg |
Socially Conscious Design
Design Like You Give a Damn is a book that focuses on social ethics in architecture. It looks at how architects and designers need to design for those who cannot afford it. It is important to focus on cultures that do not have the means to have shelter, water, and health care like people do in the developed world. Not just in undeveloped nations do architects need to focus their efforts but in emergency relief. Architects need to use their knowledge to help those who need it not just those who can afford it. Designing for social change should not be a deterrent from good design but a chance to explore new innovative ideas. (Architecture for Humanity 2006)
Technology innovations allows for new opportunities in socially conscious design. In Kate Stohr’s 100 Years of Humanitarian Design, she explains not just the existance of humanitarian design but the evolution of design and technology. The Dymaxion House by Buckmister Fuller was an example of innovative thinking in the past. The Dymaxion house embodied the idea of sustainablilty in resources and lifestyle that could be implemented. This house is a home that is low cost and able to be sent anywhere. Buckminster Fuller’s technology with the geodensic dome as well dymaxion home was the stable of technology and sustainablity in the history of architecture. (Architecture for Humanity 2006)
Examples in Design Like You Give a Damn that show that mobile architecture has started to become an effective strategy to change social issues. The Mobile Health Clinic allows by Architecture for Humanity allows for immediate service and also gives back as a community center. (Architecture for Humanity 2006)
Micro Finance
Architecture designed for these cultures have program that are needed like health services, shelter and community functions. One major element that separates the developed world from the undeveloped world is a type of banking that works for their needs. Mohammad Yunus invented micro financing which accomplishes just that. Micro financing is a banking opportunity for small loans to be given in these cultures that people use to start small businesses. Yunus wrote about his story in Banker to the Poor. This book goes through the story of how the first bank, Grameen Bank, was started and the culture of the process of how it works. (Yunus 1999)
One focus that this book has was women’s role in micro finance. Micro finance is needed in cultures that treat women very differently that developed countries. Some places where they rarely looked at in an authoritative figure and cannot do anything without their husband. Some women are in positions where husbands are not there or they are not trustworthy. Grameen Bank allows for these women to succeed on their own and create a life for themselves. How women have been treated in their society made them trustworthy for loans. Women eventually run these banks, they become the loan officers to new women. Micro finance does not just help poverty levels but role of women in society. Not all loans are women but majority of them are. (Yunus 1999)
The Microfinance Handbook explains the process that a micro financing bank has to go through to succeed. Starting with the cultural factors like site, people and existing financial situation, it sets up steps to understand the process. (Ledgerwood 1998)
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| Image 1.2 Understanding the Country Context (Ledgerwood 1998) |
It lays out the fundamentals of micro financing while understanding the type of client and also focusing on making a successful bank. It teaches how understand the qualities of a client and to make a successful investment. This investment includes teaching clients about credit, insurance, savings and loan payments. The book sets up different approaches (image 1.3) to micro financing. (Ledgerwood 1998)
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| Image 1.3 Minimalist and Integrated Approaches to Microfinance (Ledgerwood 1998) |
Understanding the system framework is important but also understanding how to evaluate the bank is important to making it successful. The Handbook explains how to gauge the process and how to adjust where the bank needs to. (Ledgerwood 1998)
Mobile, Flexible and Light Architecture
Having a socially conscious programmatic intervention is a piece to creating a space that actually gives back and helps the community it is put in. Featherweights is a book by Oliver Herwig that explores ideas of mobile, flexible and light architecture. (Herwig 2003)
He looks at specific archtiects that contributed to light arcitecture and at techtonics of numerous case studies. Along with Kate Stohr in Design Like You Give a Damn, Buckminster Fuller plays a big role in light archtiecture and his creation of the geodesic dome. The dome according to Stohr allowed for quick emergency facilities. The idea a quick structure allows for the ability for change in an emergency. (Architecture for Humanity 2006) Herwig focused on the spacial quality of the dome, geometry and spans. The Dymaxion house and Fuller’s idea of the 4D plays a role in idea of placing a building anywhere and being sustainable. (Herwig 2003)
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| Image 1.4 R. Buckminster Fuler with an early model of his Dymaxion House, Buckminster Fuller Institute (Architecture for Humanity 2006) |
Herwig looks at the tectonics of lightweight construction. From Richard Roger’s Millennium dome and quality of material in different membranes. Herwig takes light architecture and finds all possible meaning and gives examples throughout architecture. One section is on ‘Modern Nomads’, which focus on the option of mobility in architecture. It is not necessarily physically light but light when it comes to connecting with the earth. This also connects back the 4D of Fuller and the idea of sustainable living. (Herwig 2003)
Mobility is shown by case studies in the books Mobile and More Mobile. Edited both by Jennifer Siegal they both bring new information to the concept of architecture being mobile. Mobile sets up the original argument of comparing stationary and mobile architecture. By using case studies with different parameters of what being siteless or universal is. Mobile has a focus on the idea of moving events. These events are for socially conscious programs and how their organization and mobility promotes the organization hosting the event. This book promotes the idea of a built form to surpass the restrictions of site, weather and geography. (Codrescu, Kronenburg and Siegal 2002) (Stewart, Mitchell and Siegal 2008)
More Mobile focuses on the understanding of the effects of the ability to be mobile. This means looking at sustainability and also the opportunity of flexibility. Stewart looks at Shigero Bans ability to design temporary theaters and emergency homes out of materials, like cardboard, that allow for disassembly and reuse. (Stewart, Mitchell and Siegal 2008)
More Mobile promotes the idea of home and what are the qualities of home. According to Stewart, “home is where you are” and where you are could be anywhere. Taking technology of the digital world and mixing it with the ability to move around the world. This book hold future plans the mobile architecture can allow for people to see and be a part of the world. (Stewart, Mitchell and Siegal 2008)
Using the main idea of designing for those in need sets up for combination of micro financing and mobility to be a solution. The ability to have a quick set up does not just allow the process of micro finance to be adapted quickly but it allows for money and labor to be saved. The quick availability of a mobile structure can allow for quick response to poverty and other social issues. The design strategies in for mentioned books are techniques that architects need to focus on so they can be implemented where needed. These are strategies that can give people the tools to help themselves. Design Like You Give a Damn sets up for a change in the focus of architecture to those in need, not just those who can afford it. (Architecture for Humanity 2006)
Bibliography
Architecture for Humanity. Design Like You Give a Damn: Architectural Responses to Humanitarian. New York: Distributed Art Publishers, 2006.
Codrescu, Andrei, Robert Kronenburg, and Jennifer Siegal. Mobile: The Art of Portable Architecture. Hong Kong: Princeton Architectural Press, 2002.
Herwig, Oliver. Featherweights: Light, Mobile and Floating Architecture. Munich: Prestel, 2003.
Ledgerwood, Joanna. Other World Bank : Microfinance Handbook : An Institutional and Financial Perspective. Washington D.C.: World Bank Publications, 1998.
Stewart, Jude, William J Mitchell, and Jennifer Siegal. More Mobile: Portable Architecture for Today. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2008.
Yunus, Muhammad. Banker to the Poor: Micro-lending and the battle against world poverty. New York: PublicAffairs, 1999.
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