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Rukurato Hall, Banyoro, Uganda and the Great Hall, KNUST, Ghana: Two case studies from Africa
Full text linkThis article presents two modernist building case studies, one each from East and West Africa which explore approaches to modernist public building conservation. The Rukurato Hall in East Africa, formerly used as a regional assembly hall for the Bunyoro Kingdom in Uganda, is now used as the parliament building of the Bunyoro Kitara Kingdom.The Great Hall in West Africa at the Kumasi University of Science and Technology (KNUST) serves as an institutional hall; it is a monument of academic and cultural significance in Kumasi. This article delves into the historical evolution of the Great Hall, which has hosted numerous essential events, ranging from local academic gatherings to distinguished international conferences since 1967. The Great Hall’s rich heritage and architectural prominence have been subject to various interventions aimed at conserving its essence. The examination of these interventions in maintaining the integrity of the building while adapting to the changing needs of the university underscores the delicate balance required between modernization and safeguarding cultural and architectural legacies.Both case studies present contrasting views on the challenges of conservation in the African context, resulting in different conservation efforts. In the case of the Rukurato Hall, arguable the loss of function for a significant period, before reinstatement in the late 1990s and challenges of funding have greatly influenced the ability to realize conservation ambitions. In the Great Hall, whilst conservation funds were secured, and the conservation effort was successful, the use of the Hall has been ‘controlled’ and various actions have arguably tested the authenticity of the conservation process transforming the building aesthetic in the process. This article employs methods of document analysis, archival research, and interviews with key stakeholders
Documenting the Reuse of Modern Buildings: An appraisal of a 2022 British Academy writing workshop of postgraduate students and researchers
Full text linkThis paper looks into the 2022 writing workshop sponsored by the British Academy with Nigerian and Ghanaian participants. It was focussed on the present status of modern buildings, which are quickly replaced by newer ones, eroding the prevailing vernacular of the landscape of African university campuses. A new approach was adopted to documenting the stories of these buildings, which had existed prior to the time, by Africans, not foreigners. Postgraduate students were co-opted to participate in a five-day writing workshop across three universities in Nigeria. The teams were headed by Early Career Researchers (ECRs) led by a Nigerian Co-Investigator (Co-I), similar to a workshop held in Ghana just a week before. The Principal Investigator (PI) was based in the United Kingdom and assisted by two co-investigators, one from Nigeria and one from Ghana. For the Nigerian contingent, the loci group comprised four participants per group (12 participants in each of the three universities in Lagos, Jos, and Enugu campus). At each university, the participants selected modern buildings on the campus to write about, guided by the ECRs. Scheduled meetings were arranged for expert presentations, site visits, and group meet-ups to discuss their working papers. Recommendations were made for architectural histories and criticisms to be introduced into the students’ curriculum, from which publications and documentation of these buildings can be carried out concurrently. Grants and awards can also be targeted at universities both locally and globally to further improve this approach. Emphasis on the cultural point of view was encouraged in the writing exercise to preserve the heritage aspects of the buildings
Towards a Housing Preservation Culture
Full text linkAfter the two 2022-issues of the Docomomo Journal, number 66 on ‘Modern Plastic Heritage’ and number 67 on ‘Multiple Modernisms in Ukraine,’ this issue reveals another chapter of an often and diversely described theme of Modern Movement and a pressing subject worldwide: Housing
Shared Heritage Africa: Rediscovering masterpieces
Full text linkDocomomo International is proud to present the results of the international project Shared Heritage Africa: Rediscovering Masterpieces and other selected papers from our call for papers Shared Heritage Africa – Campuses, published in December 2022. The SHA project itself, coordinated by Docomomo Germany, focused on rediscovering post-war modern buildings from the 1950s-1980s in the partner countries Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, and Rwanda. This period of independence from colonial rule, from the United Kingdom (Ghana 1957, Nigeria 1960, and Uganda 1962) and from Belgium (Rwanda 1962), has a great socio-political significance and influence on the educational systems and buildings. The rediscovery of this heritage focuses on exploring the values, challenges, and opportunities through the eyes of their contemporary users. Concentrating on the post-war modern buildings constructed after independence from colonial rule, the project celebrated projects that are situated at the periphery of the architectural discourse and, therefore, seldom documented despite their social, economic, and political significance.This Docomomo journal highlights the importance of the combination of local workshops, including student writing and photography workshops, exhibitions and ‘digital fellowships’ using the internet for dissemination. Exploratory interviews and narratives are used to collect testimonies of contemporary users⎯applied in the SHA project as well as in the other articles. Aspects discussed are, among others, the physical; deterioration (technical, functional, social), the cosmological; through the sense of identity, community, place attachment, maintenance and taking care, ownership and appropriation, and the environmental; considering the quality, and sustainability of spaces, and also conditions of comfort and satisfaction. While the method is in development, preliminary conclusions can already be sketched. The written, visual, and digital documentation of the built cultural heritage of Africa is a prerequisite for sustainable urban and social development. The approach builds upon African and international Docomomo initiatives and identifies students and young professionals as important groups to develop social, cultural, and political awareness and to further advance participatory tools.Most relevant were the partners in and from Africa who helped with their networks in Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, and Rwanda during the excursions and exhibitions: Ola Uduku (University of Liverpool), Taibat Lawanson (University of Lagos) are well-known and respected for their research on education buildings and urban development in Africa. Their commitment to the younger generations and the (built) heritage of Africa and their enthusiasm were instrumental to the achievements of the SHA project. Kuukuwa Manful from Docomomo Accra Chapter in Ghana finished her dissertation within the ERC program ‘African State Architecture’ during the project duration, and Mark Olweny (Uganda Martyrs University) in Kampala, Uganda, greatly supported the visit to Uganda and Rwanda. The photography and writing workshops and exhibitions were strongly supported by the project partners, namely photographer Jean Molitor, who has initiated his own art project ‘bau1haus’, is experienced in setting up exhibitions and shared his knowledge enthusiastically with the SHA-Fellows. Christian Burkhard brought in the competence of Architectuul, an architectural platform that, through its co-workers in various countries, forms an international architecture community. Finally, Anica Dragutinovic (TH OWL) coordinated the contact amongst the SHA-Fellows from the very beginning and during their visits to Europe to the 17th International Docomomo Conference in Valencia in 2022 and to the 19th Docomomo Germany Conference in Frankfurt 2023. Three exhibitions were organized: in Lagos in 2022, in Kampala and in Frankfurt in 2023.We also like to thank the members of the SHA project’s Advisory board: Ana Tostoes (University of Lisbon), Iain Jackson (University of Liverpool), Irene Appeaning Addo (University of Ghana), Kaija Voss (Architectural Historian), and Tino Mager (ICOMOS Germany).Finally, we are grateful to the German Federal Foreign Ministry that supported the project with a grant (AZ99210073) from 2021-2023, and it is with great pleasure that we are launching this issue of the Docomomo journal, published both in print and online via www.docomomojournal.com
Reviving the Modern Architecture of Arieh Sharon’s Obafemi Awolowo University, Ilé-Ifẹ̀ , Nigeria
Full text linkObafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ilé-Ifẹ̀, Nigeria, was established after Nigeria’s independence in 1960 as the University of Ife. Bauhaus architecture school graduate Arieh Sharon (1900-1984) designed the master plan and most of the initial buildings in the university core through Israeli-Nigerian technical development relations. The often written about campus is one of the most prominent modern architectural exemplars in Africa and one of the exhibits during the one-hundred-year celebration of Bauhaus–Bauhaus 100–in 2019. Like many examples of modern architecture around the world, this campus needs conservation measures for various reasons, including being out of contemporary functional use. However, this campus is in intensive use; in fact, the expanding use and minimal awareness of inherent values coupled with maintenance issues are the major reasons for conservation measures. Local and international collaboration of concerned partners resulted in the Conservation Management Plan (CMP) of the Ilé-Ifẹ̀ campus being one of the 13 projects funded by the Getty Keeping-It-Modern (KIM) 2020 program with complementary measures funded by Gerda Henkel Stiftung. This paper details the actions taken so far in conserving the unique modern architecture of the university and the future actions needed to ensure it continues to occupy its place in architectural discourse
African Agency and Colonial Committees at Fourah Bay College : Architecture and planning of the new Fourah Bay College in Freetown, Sierra Leone
Full text linkFourah Bay College was the first Western-style university to be established along the West African coast in 1827. Primarily used to train missionaries and traders operating in British West Africa, it remained one of the premier educational establishments, overlooking the docks of Cline Town in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Following the Colonial Development and Welfare Acts and civil unrest in the aftermath of World War II, British colonial policy began to fund a series of secondary and tertiary education institutions. Modeled on the new University of the West Indies, these new universities adopted the residential college dorm typology coupled with the latest modernist architecture designed to enhance climatic comfort.A new campus was proposed for Fourah Bay, and in contrast to earlier precedents, the architectural approach was to be more humble and less monumental. Following a masterplan by London-based architects Norman and Dawbarn, the much smaller and relatively unknown British practice of Frank Rutter was appointed to design most of the campus buildings. The centerpiece is a large concrete tower named after John F. Kennedy, symbolic of the shifting political posturing for control and influence. Following Independence in 1961 and with increasing technical aid offered to neighboring Ghana and Nigeria from Socialist Eastern European powers, Fourah Bay College demonstrated how these political attempts for influence were directly played out through these newly formed institutions. Fourah Bay College also reveals the African agency in appointing architects and who was able to control the procurement processes and design teams. Rutter was dismissed as ‘college architect’ by a small contingent of newly qualified Sierra Leonean architects eager to ensure local appointments and architectural expressions were given opportunity. The campus, with its impressive architectural structures and innovative solutions, mirrors the political flux and shifting global power structures of the late 1950s and early 1960s, along with the local agency of Freetown architects and their quest to shape the future
Post-WWII Modernism with a glaze: A comparison between Antwerp and Lisbon
Full text linkPost World War II European modern housing often exhibited a Corbusian influence, but Le Corbusier was not embraced to the same extent everywhere, as noticed during exchanges between the University of Lisbon and the University of Antwerp in the ambit of the COST-Action 18137 on MCMH. While Belgium has several 1950s social housing projects, strongly indebted in its Unité d’habitation in Marseilles, Portugal does not. There, social housing architecture remained rather conservative, even though Corbusian features manifested themselves in some middle-class mass housing projects, such as the complex on Avenida Estados Unidos da América in Lisbon (1954-1966) designed by Lucínio Cruz, Alberto Ayres de Sousa and Mário Oliveira. While the housing blocks are on pilotis, they also have notable Art-Deco elements. In Belgium, free-standing modernist housing on pilotis with Art-Deco features also appears, such as the housing project at the Jan De Voslei in Antwerp designed by Jos Smolderen (1952-1967). These Modernist/Art-Deco hybrids have never been explored in depth because they are considered not radical enough. However, these cases shed light on how (older) architects mediated between traditional architecture and Modernism, between their own preferences and those of the state or housing company. They illuminate the political, social, and urban context in which these buildings were created. This paper explains why the principles Belgian architects applied to social housing were closer to Lisbon’s middle-class housing than their similar buildings for low-income housing. Based on cross-referencing archival material, legislation, on-site observations, and a study of the political, urban and social context, this paper posits a re-reading of Le Corbusier’s legacy in middle-class housing in Lisbon versus Antwerp
Books and Reviews
Full text linkA review by Mark R. O. Olweny of Fugitive Archives: A Sourcebook for Centering Africa in Histories of Architecture edited by Claire Lubell and Rafico Ruiz (2023) and a review by Immaculata Abba of Architecture and Politics in Nigeria: The Study of a Late Twentieth-century Enlightenment-inspired Modernism at Abuja, 1900-2016, Nnamdi Elleh (2020)
Improving the Quality of Life and Sustainability for Middle-Class Mass Housing: Perspectives from a Stakeholder Workshop
Full text linkThis article presents and discusses the results of the Stakeholder Workshop (Co) Designing for Quality of Life: Exploring Challenges and Opportunities, which was held at Middle East Technical University (METU) in Ankara in October 2022 in the framework of the COST Action CA18137 European Middle Class Mass Housing (MCMH-EU). The workshop aimed to discover the possibilities of participatory design as a tool to address the necessary updating of the housing complexes of the Modern Movement (MoMo). The workshop, which was conducted on a cooperative housing estate, namely Ümitköy Sitesi, Ankara, Türkiye (1970), was carried out in five groups with members of different nationalities, ages, and experiences. This article argues that the public and private strategies which were followed to rehabilitate these complexes by focusing on the technical problems (construction pathologies, energy inefficiency, accessibility, parking, among others) tend to neglect, even ignore, the diverse social aspects involved. As a group of participants of this workshop, the authors of this article consider the involvement of all parties (experts, residents, housing management cooperative, and municipality) in the improvement processes of such middle-class mass housing sites as the key instrument to make these neighborhoods more inclusive and sustainable. This article evaluates the Stakeholder Workshop’s co-design performance as an instrument to improve the Quality of life (QoL) and sustainability of the neighborhood. The critical analysis of the workshop results leads to several significant conclusions: Social aspirations do not always coincide with political and technical ones; technical rehabilitations are not sufficient for the total improvement of QoL and sustainability of communities; (Co-)Design may have to be approached from different perspectives and, consequently, have different results; citizens have a great potential to participate and contribute to the improvement of QoL with innovative ideas and actions of different scales. However, the socioeconomic diversity of the inhabitants and restrictive legislation are the difficulties to be considered