These last few years my main professional interest has been social architecture, or using architecture as a tool to bring about positive social change and improve lives. My interest in this topic was triggered by a student project in Kenya in 2015, but the real test for me was Build with Gambia, the earth architecture workshop that I led in 2018 at Kantora Arts Village, a new rural vocational school in eastern Gambia.
The main goal of Build with Gambia was to design and build a dormitory for the vocational school but there were other goals, many related to social aspects such as improving the lives of the locals. This article is a follow up to a previous article that focused on the technical aspects of the earth building workshop. Ultimately, the social aspects were more challenging than the technical ones, but they were also the ones with more potential for positive impact.
Karsi Kunda and Kantora Arts Village
The setting of Build with Gambia Earth Architecture Workshop was the small village of Karsi Kunda in the far east of The Gambia, only five kilometers from the Senegalese border. Nobody seems to know the population of Karsi Kunda but there are 25 compounds in the village, with extended family living in each. The village is not connected to the electric grid, but a few families own solar panels that can be used to charge phones. For transportation the locals rely mainly on their feet, as well as bicycles and donkey and horse carts.
The locals of Karsi Kunda practice subsistence farming and there are very few economic opportunities in the village. For basic necessities, most families rely on money sent by relatives working in the capital, in neighbouring countries or Europe. Many, especially the men, only stay in the village during the rainy season when there is farm work and leave for the capital or to neighbouring countries during the dry season to earn money. Europe is the ultimate goal that many dream about, and taking the dangerous “backway” through the Sahara and the Mediterranean is the only realistic way for most to reach this goal.
There is no school in Karsi Kunda, but there is a school in the neighbouring village of Song Kunda, a 15-minute walk away. However, to study past the 9th grade the children have to leave the village, and this is only possible if the family is able and willing to sponsor the child’s expenses. As a result, most children drop out of school, and even those who manage to study find that there are few job opportunities in Gambia. This is where Kantora Arts Village comes in, with the goal of providing a vocational training school where local youths from Karsi Kunda and the region can learn useful practical skills that can help them earn a livelihood.
Kantora Arts Village was founded by Nka Foundation, a US based non-profit organisation whose mission is to serve underserved communities in Africa. The pilot project of Nka Foundation was Abetenim Arts Village vocational school in Ghana, founded in 2009. Much like Abetenim, Kantora Arts Village is a long-term project that is being built slowly with the help of international workshop teams like Build with Gambia, the workshop that I lead.
The concept of Kantora Arts Village is that the construction of the school is a part of its education. In particular, the project aims to promote modern earth building techniques as sustainable and local alternatives to concrete blocks. The locals of Karsi Kunda spend a lot of money building concrete block houses, while they could use natural materials around them and instead spend the money on labour which would keep the money within the community. Traditional houses in the village are built with locally produced adobe bricks, but most locals see these houses as inferior to concrete block houses. Through experimentation with different techniques, such as rammed earth and the Nubian vault, Build with Gambia workshop aimed to raise the status of earth building.
The ten man team of local workshop participants
I first arrived to Karsi Kunda in March 2018 and I arrived without a finished design for the dormitory, preferring instead to develop the design in the local context. I wanted to start by building a small shelter where we could test different techniques, including rammed earth, the Nubian vault, colored earth and lime and clay plaster. For this stage I asked the locals to volunteer their time to help with the experimentation. I did this because I wanted the locals to realize that the project was not something for me but for them.
The results of this approach were mixed. The whole Kantora Arts Village project was just starting and the locals had little understanding of the project. As a result it was very difficult to get people to come and volunteer as they didn’t see how it would benefit them. One of the original aims of the workshop had been to work with local youths, but the people who did come to volunteer were instead the most educated and experienced people of the village, because they could better understand what we were doing and that volunteering could benefit them later. A few younger ones did eventually come – although later I found out that they only came because their parents forced them to.
By the end of the first month it was clear that there were clearly ten men who came more regularly to volunteer than others. These ten men I then hired to work on the construction of the dormitory as they were the ones who had shown most commitment to the project. Differences in age and experience created some division within the team, but overall the team worked very well together. Indeed, one of the aspect of working with rammed earth I liked the most was how it equalized the team, as everyone was just as inexperienced in the technique.
One of the goals of involving the locals was of course creating a better understanding of why we are building with earth. Knowledge sharing worked both ways as the locals with their superior knowledge of local conditions also contributed with ideas. The benefit of having local people with experience in construction was enormous, as they could better contribute with ideas and also understand new ideas. Later on I could even leave the site for weeks knowing that the local team would continue the construction. When the locals were given more responsibility, it was clear that they did things more efficiently.
Addressing the needs of the community
The locals who gained the most out of Build with Gambia workshop were the ten man team who gained not only experience but also an income. But throughout the workshop we also tried to reach out to other groups in the village, in particular women. The proportion of women in Karsi Kunda is high as many men leave the village to work elsewhere and leave their families in the village.
We tried to understand the needs of the women by trying to get them to come to the construction site. One international volunteer had built an oven where he tried to burn bricks, and later we used this oven to organize a baking event for the women. As we got to know the women better, it became clear that the women are very busy, with cooking, fetching water and cleaning taking up most of their days. Something as simple as a garden with a good fence or a solar pump at Kantora Arts Village could greatly improve their lives.
Before this event we sponsored six local women to go to the town of Basse for a one-day workshop on tie-dye technique of dyeing fabrics. The idea was that these women would gain a skill that could help them earn a livelihood and also a skill that they could share with other women by teaching at the future Kantora Arts Village vocational school. To connect this workshop to the Build with Gambia workshop, the fabrics from the workshops were made into curtains for the dormitory building.
Due to insufficient finances we unfortunately couldn’t sponsor additional workshops that the women would have needed to become qualified in tie-dye. However, this workshop and the local people’s positive reaction towards it showed that tie-dye is a potential activity to be taught at the vocational school. This activity also helped increase the local people’s awareness about what Kantora Arts Village really is.
We also organized and took part in community activities, from playing football to hosting a dinner during the annual Tobaski celebration. Through these activities we created relationships with the locals which helped increase awareness about the project. More importantly, it helped us outsiders understand the villagers and their daily challenges. We further tried to find solutions to different issues we could see, for example by organizing a trash collection day when we went around the village collecting trash that we then buried at the construction site in a hole left behind by digging earth for adobe bricks.
Challenges and future of Kantora Arts Village
The concept of Kantora Arts Village is that each building is designed and built by one international workshop team, with local and international participants working together and sharing knowledge from their different points of view. Build with Gambia was the first of these teams, but two other groups started building classrooms a few months after us. Being the pioneers was extra challenging, as it was difficult both for us and the locals to know what would really happen to the building in the future and how the vocational school project would progress.
A lot of conflicting thoughts passed through my mind during my year in Karsi Kunda, and I wondered many times whether I should be there. One of these conflicts was that the community of Karsi Kunda never asked for this project – they were simply happy to have any project even if they didn’t understand it. At some point I also lost faith in Nka Foundation and started to doubt whether there was any future for the building or Kantora Arts Village. Fortunately, I have recently heard some promising updates about educational activities such as carpentry starting at the vocational school soon.
It was the optimism of the locals that helped move the project forward during uncertain times. When we were having issues due to lack of funds and volunteers, it was the locals who were most determined to continue the project, even if it meant that they wouldn’t get paid for all the work. International teams come and go but the locals stay, and it is up to the locals of Karsi Kunda to take ownership over the project in a way that improves their lives. Hopefully, their investment will pay off and their children can have a better future thanks to Kantora Arts Village.
