PLAYscapes Design Competition Results Announced

In April, we launched the Building Trust international design competition PLAYscapes. I am very happy to share with you the results of the competition.

Which city is the most fun? London, NYC, Buenos Aires, Bangkok, Moscow, Cape Town? To answer the question Building Trust international asked professional and student architects and designers from cities around the World to propose ideas which encouraged public interaction and turned redundant city spaces into fun creative places.

Winning Professional PLAYscape entry

A multidisciplinary team from the City of Cape Town have been announced as the Professional winners in a design competition that hopes to turn neglected forgotten parts of cities into interactive playscapes. The competition had over 500 registered entrants and a jury including representatives from Building Trust International, Project for Public Spaces, BMW Guggenheim Lab, Landscape Architects Network, 3Space, Neon Stash, Land8 and academics & professionals from the fields of architecture and landscape design.

The design competition asked for a PLAYscape proposal that creates community involvement and turns a neglected space into a place for public interaction and creativity. We are proud to announce the winning design as Cape Town Gardens Skate Park. The project team comprises of Gerrit Strydom, Lwandile Gcume and Aline Cremon from the City of Cape Town, Errol van Amsterdam & Marvin Fester from C2C Consulting Engineers with Skatepark design by Clive Crofton of Spyda Ramps. The team developed the design through lengthy consultation with both local residents, skaters and the national body, The National Skate Collective.

The jury selected the design as the competition winner due to its intelligent re-use of space transforming an under used and blighted underpass into a community led skate park. The jury were also very impressed with the high level of involvement and consultation with local residents and the future users of the park. There were also 9 honourable mentions in the Professional category located in sites ranging from Melbourne to London.

Gerrit Strydom, Winning team entrant said, “For the project to be selected as the winning submission, not only serves to internationally recognise the merit of the project in itself, but stands testament to the importance and value of the broader dialogue about the abundant opportunities for activating difficult public spaces for the benefit of diverse set of users. By elevating the status and awareness of the project the award will stimulate the proliferation of similar initiatives across the metropolitan region and cities in South Africa. “

Winning Student Proposal

The winning entry from the Student category has been announced as ‘Bring a Pal and have fun’ by a team from Lusiada University of Lisbon, Faculty of Architecture and Arts. Student team member Ricardo Morais said, “Initially we decided to redevelop the space, building furniture equipment made with euro pallets, a material that is structurally sturdy, inexpensive and easy to find anywhere in the World.”

A wide range of submissions made use of sustainable materials and highlighted the need for everyone throughout the World to look at
the forgotten parts of their cities and think about adaptive reuse and redevelopment of existing sites. The short listed designs show a wide range of well thought out ideas for sites around the World where potentially problematic areas can become unique places that can be celebrated by all of us.

Urban Zipline – Honourable Mention in Professional Category

David Cole founding partner of Building Trust international said, “The competition was a huge success, the winning project had an incredible level of thought and community involvement. The potential for this project to become a flagship in regenerating other areas in both Cape Town and other cities is exciting and we look forward to helping realise the project over the coming months.”

Plant-a-ball-parks Honourable Mention in Professional category

The aim of the competition was to show how creatively we can make cities fun places with opportunities for interaction and play. The competition sought out fun and exciting new ways to get people to interact with the city on a different level. Regeneration of cities should not just be about increasing value and foot fall but should capture people’s imaginations making them want to get involved and experiment with new things.

You can see the winning and honourable mention proposal on the Building Trust website see HERE

You can also see the PLAYscape competition brief HERE

Many thanks for reading the announcement we cannot wait to work with the winning team in Cape Town to turn their PLAYscape design into a reality.

Louise

Moving School 003 complete

Mae Sot, Thailand

It has been a while since I last updated you with the progress of Moving School 003 at Hope School on the outskirts of Mae Sot in Thailand. After the foundations were fitted by the local community it was time to bolt together the structure for the classrooms.

Steel frame structure Moving School 003

Moving School 003 consists of 2 large classrooms which will be a cool, light learning environment for the pupils of Hope School. After the steel structure was secured in place, the next step was to fit the roof material. The Ironwood team along with Jan Glasmeier from Agora Architects and the Building Trust team fixed the roof into place before the rainy season really began!

Fixing Roof material to Moving School 003

Rainy season starts in Mae Sot!!

With the roof firmly secured in place the team were able to begin fitting the cementitious wood floor boards into the school structure and began fixing the twin polycarbonate material for the wall panels into place. The polycarbonate material was kindly donated by Bayer Thailand.

Twin polycarbonate material for walls is fitted

The final result of the Moving School 003 design is truly fantastic, not only will the structure provide a light and clean environment for the students but the structure also fits well into the bamboo forest surroundings.

Moving School 003

Moving School 003 internal classroom

Many thanks to all those involved in the construction of Moving School 003 and to Bayer Thailand for their very generous donation of fabric to create the walls of Moving School 002 and 003.

We look forward to sharing further images of the pupils enjoying their new school building in the coming months.

Thanks for reading,

Louise

Construction of sustainable, flood resistant housing is underway in Cambodia

Phnom Penh, Cambodia

I am very pleased to share with you the latest photos of the construction of two of the winning house designs from The Future of Sustainable Housing in Cambodia competition. The winners were announced in March and we are very happy to see progress of the builds on the outskirts of Phnom Penh.

‘Open Embrace’ by Lisa Ekle & Keith Greenwald’s design allowed for the selected family of 5 to have an open house design made from both brick and wood.

Construction worker at Open Embrace site

The house has been constructed under the supervision of the Habitat for Humanity Cambodia team and a local workforce skilled in building houses.

Open Embrace

The second design which has recently finished construction is Courtyard House by Jess Lumley and Alexander Koller from the UK. Their design was chosen by a family who needed a space to keep chickens.

Family consultation at Courtyard House

The family were brought to the construction site to discuss with the Habitat for Humanity Cambodia team about their house design.

Courtyard House under construction

Courtyard House is complete

With two of the three homes complete and the families settled into their new homes, I look forward to sharing with you photos of the third winning design WET/DRY house very soon.

Many thanks once again for the amazing support and assistance of the Habitat for Humanity Cambodia team and their local workforce for creating such fantastic homes for families very much in need.

Thanks for reading,

Louise

Moving School 002 complete!

With the roof and floor installed at the New Road site, the Ironwood team were ready to fit the walls to the school building.  After a successful meeting with Bayer AG, a German chemical and pharmaceutical company in Bangkok we received the fantastic news that the organisation would provide the wall material for both Moving School 002 and 003. The material to be used was a twin walled polycarbonate which has the benefit of being lightweight, durable and UV resistant and would allow the internal classrooms to be kept cool and light.

A member of the Bayer team from the Bangkok office kindly agreed to visit us in Mae Sot bringing with him a wealth of knowledge as to how to install the material. He instructed us the best methods of using the material and the suitable fixings to ensure the product remained water tight.

The next step was to construct the wooden panels which would hold the plastic sheets in place. When all panels were finished and made in the workshop they were taken to the Moving School 002 site to be installed while classes continued for the school pupils in the old cramped building.

New Road pupils in their old school building

The wooden panels were built with sections to be used for windows which will add extra ventilation and light when needed into the classrooms.

We were very happy to see Moving School 002 nearly complete and looking fantastic! We would like to thank Bayer for kindly donating the polycarbonate material which will ensure the classrooms stay light and airy and have a great impact on the learning environment of the pupils from New Road.

It was now time for the Opening Ceremony and Bayer kindly treated the boys & girls of New Road to ice cream and a new school book.

Opening Ceremony of Moving School 002

Inside MOVINGschool 002

We would like to thank the fantastic team at Ironwood for their hard work and dedication and to Jan from Agora Architects for his support and assistance. We look forward to sharing with you photos of the pupils in their new school classrooms very soon!

Thanks for reading,

Louise

HOPE school – Moving School 003!

Existing bamboo school

We received fantastic news recently at Building Trust HQ that the Japan Association for the Mae Tao Clinic (JAM) have been able to provide funding to help us provide a further mobile, modular school to a migrant and refugee community on the outskirts of Mae Sot. Hope school, which we initially visited in the Summer of 2012, desperately needs facilities for a new classroom.  We will be building a new school building for Hope in collaboration with Agora Architects in Mae Sot. Their school is located in the valley of a bamboo forest with beautiful surroundings but a slightly challenging environment due to very slippery conditions and the school being very remote.

Site visit with JAM

We discussed in detail with the School headmistress and teachers as to the position of their new classroom, thinking about the position of the sun during the day and the effect it would have on the light in the classroom. The Headmistress advised the size and scale of the classrooms needed and we discussed where they would sit on the school site.

BTi discuss with School Headmistress

After a few days in the Ironwood workshop cutting and drilling the steel required to create the school structure all components were brought to site on the back of a pick up truck. The local community agreed to dig the foundation holes needed for the structure and helped bring the steel to site.

Local community bring foundation feet to site

While the community dug the foundation holes in the drizzling rain, the Ironwood team set the frames out and began drilling and bolting the frames together.

Ironwood team put frame structure together

The frames were then carried near to the site of the new school classroom ready to be lifted over the foundation feet and bolted into place.

Steel frame is moved into position

Next the Ironwood team, Agora Architects and Building Trust members helped to prepare the concrete mixture ready to fill the foundation holes which contain one truck tyre and the steel foundation post.

Agora Architects lift truck tyre into foundation hole

The next stage will be to fill the foundations with the concrete mix and set the foundations.

I look forward to updating you with the next stages of our third Moving School.

Thanks for reading,

Louise

The latest from Moving Schools 002

My friends at New Road

AN UPDATE FROM MOVING SCHOOL 002

After a fantastic couple of days bringing the steel to site and installing the classroom frames, the next task was to fix all the floor joists in place and drill holes into the ceiling beams ready to take the roofing structure.

Ironwood team drill holes into ceiling beams

A few of the pupils spent their lunchtime lending a hand and helping us to paint more of the steel sections for their new classroom. It was great to see their enthusiasm and eagerness to help out on site.

New Road pupil painting team

The local community arrived on site ready to work and decided to build a walkway from the current school building to the new classrooms. Travelling to the nearest place we could source bamboo, several of the parents cut down 15 pieces of bamboo and then split and stripped the bamboo. They used the bamboo as a replacement for a metal frame to go at the bottom of the base of the walkway in preparation for a concrete mixture to be poured on top.

Criss cross bamboo frame structure is created

Mixture of sand, gravel and cement is mixed to make concrete

It was fantastic to have the local communities support and assistance in the school project. Both the students and parents were keen to see the Ironwood team working and have the ability to share their different skill sets.

Ironwood team on site with school pupils

Next to be installed was the metal roof structure and finally the Shera board flooring material for the classroom floor.

Roof is installed

Shera Board floor is installed

It is great to see the classroom structure taking form on site at New Road, we cannot wait to see the pupils using their new classroom buildings.

Wall and floor are installed

I look forward to updating you with final pictures of Moving School 002 very soon.

Thanks for reading,

Louise

LIVE Update from Moving Schools 002

UPDATE LIVE from the Thai/Burma border:

Well we are back in Mae Sot continuing the construction of Moving School 002 in Mae Ramat on the Thai/Burma border. After completing the foundations in April, we were now ready to start lifting the steel frame structure of the school classrooms into place.

Children from New Road watch as their school is constructed

All the steel required for Moving School 002 fitted easily onto one truck and was then transported from the Ironwood workshop to the school site in Mae Ramat.  The first task on site was to check the level across the whole structure using a water level, the same technique as used previously on the first Moving School.

Soon after the truck was unloaded, the Ironwood team and Building Trust began setting out the steel frames on site and bolting the sections together.

Student from New Road helps Building Trust bolt frame together

When the structure was bolted together the frames were then simply lifted above the foundation posts and bolted into place at the correct height. The frames are then locked in together across the whole structure with floor joists and roofing frame.

Ironwood and parents place floor joists into place

The next step will be to connect all floor joists into place and then attach Shera board to create the classroom flooring. Shera board is a cementitious wood board which we used on the first Moving School, it is very strong, durable and cleans easily so is great for the flooring of the classrooms. The roof for the school will arrive on site tomorrow and I look forward to sharing with you photos of the installation very soon.

Thanks for reading,

Louise

Opening night of the Future of Sustainable Housing in Cambodian Exhibition

On Thursday 16th May, The Future of Sustainable Housing In Cambodia exhibition opened to the public. A wide range of visitors from a variety of backgrounds and professions came to see the short listed and winning housing designs from Building Trust’s 3rd International design competition.

The Future of Sustainable Housing in Cambodia Exhibition

It was fantastic to work with local Cambodian architecture students, who created 1 to 20 scale models of some of the housing designs. These were showcased at the exhibition and received a lot of attention. They were a fantastic addition to the exhibition and allowed visitors to see a 3D representation of the housing designs. Many thanks to the team of students who constructed the models.

Phase House Model

It was great to see the number of local students who attended the exhibition and had a real interest in learning about the future possibilities of housing in Cambodia. Several local professors attended and were very keen to set similar design competitions to their students as part of their curriculum.

I look forward to updating you with the progress of the project and photos from the live builds which will start at the end of the month, providing three low income families with their chosen housing design.

Opening night

Thanks for reading, please see more photos from the exhibition here

Louise

 

The Future of Sustainable Housing in Cambodia exhibition.

An update from Cambodia!

I am currently working on the preparation for The Future of Sustainable Housing in Cambodia exhibition which will be held at Meta House Gallery in Phnom Penh from 17 to 23rd May.  The exhibition will showcase low cost, flood resistant, sustainable housing designs that aim to shape the future of housing in Cambodia. The event will showcase architects work from around the globe focused on creating a more sustainable future for Cambodia’s poor. The winning and short listed designs are from the recent International Design competition which Building Trust International hosted alongside Habitat for Humanity, Karuna Cambodia and the Cambodian Society of Architects.

If you are in Phnom Penh during the time of the exhibition please do pop along to check out the fantastic designs on display. Alongside the designs there will also be scale models of some of the projects. We are currently working alongside students from local Cambodian Universities including the Royal University of Fine Arts to produce the models. It is fantastic to have the support of the local students some of whom actually entered the Cambodian Housing competition!

Model Making with local students

I look forward to updating next week with photos from the exhibition which has been kindly sponsored by Hongkong Land one of Asia’s leading property investment, management and development groups.

Many thanks for reading!

Louise

Foundations are set at New Road School

My Vodafone WOD placement at Building Trust international may have finished but work doesn’t stop. With the rainy season quickly approaching in Thailand it was very important that we work with the local teachers and parents of New Road school to set the foundations for their new school before the rains started. Having previously set the grid for the foundations and bringing truck tyres to site we were ready to start digging the holes and setting the foundations.  With the parents and teachers keen to help out it was left to their committee to dig the 14 foundation holes. Overnight, 7 parents and teachers excavated the foundations to precise accuracy. This was fantastic as it meant by day two we could begin filling in the holes with truck tyres and a concrete mixture. It was amazing to arrive at site the next day and see the vast number of people ready and waiting to carry out work on the foundations. With sand, gravel and tyres delivered to site we were ready to begin mixing the concrete mixture and setting the foundations.

Parents mix concrete for foundations

A team of men from the committee began mixing the concrete mixture by hand, with a further team delivering buckets of sand and gravel to the mix. Within less than an hour several of the foundation holes were set, it was easy to see that many of the people helping had a background in the construction industry.

Jay works on foundation posts

It was great to have Jay a volunteer from Chile on site to help with the foundations, he carefully fed rebar into the foundation feet to give added support.  It was not only volunteers and parents who helped out but also the pupils of the New Road school. They were happy to carry buckets of the sand and gravel to the site and were excited to see the start of their new school.

School pupils help out on site!

To ensure the foundation holes were level a home made plumb bob and line was made from a stone and string to ensure all foundations were at right angles. Each foundation post was also clearly marked with a marker pen to show the centre position of the foundation for ease when the steel frame structure is fitted to the foundations posts at a later date.

Plumb Bob and Line

After just a few hours all the foundations were set and ready for the upcoming rainy season. This will be a great benefit when we begin the construction of the school in June as it is easier to mix concrete and work on foundations without the rain.

After 2 days all 14 foundations holes were completed! The steel for the school frame structure has been delivered to the Iron Wood workshop for the apprentices to begin drilling holes and cutting the steel to construct the frames. I look forward to updating you on the school build progression soon.

Foundation holes are complete

Thanks for reading,

Louise