WSM Architects

WSM Architects Architecture is the physical expression of the dreams and ambitions of our society. We design buildings to attract people to them

www.wsminvestment.blogspot.comMONUMENTAL ACHIEVEMENT | David Adjaye near the construction site of the National Museum of...
16/03/2015

www.wsminvestment.blogspot.com
MONUMENTAL ACHIEVEMENT | David Adjaye near the construction site of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, in Washington, D.C.

14/03/2015
13/03/2015
Kunle Adeyemi, the Nigerian-born founder of NLE Architects, made waves last year with the completion of one of his desig...
13/03/2015

Kunle Adeyemi, the Nigerian-born founder of NLE Architects, made waves last year with the completion of one of his designs: a floating, three-story A-frame school built in Makoko, a slum on the waterfront of Lagos, Nigeria.
Building floating homes in Nigeria
Bobbing on top of about 250 empty barrels, the school is designed to avoid many of the problems associated with frequently rising water levels. The structure is also green: it makes use of rainwater collection, and solar panels provide the electricity.
Though the school accommodates a mere 100 elementary school children, it has potential to act as a model for water-bound communities the world over.
"It didn't start as a big idea, I was trying to solve a small problem the community had. I realized the problem I was trying to solve was a problem for a larger part of the world," Adeymi told CNN last year.
"We're now seeing people take interest in this across Africa."

Peter Rich's greatest contribution to African architecture has been through his seminal research into African concepts o...
11/03/2015

Peter Rich's greatest contribution to African architecture has been through his seminal research into African concepts of space-making in sub-Saharan Africa, including traditional transitional and contemporary applications. He co-founded the Kigali-based practice Light Earth Design in order to lead the development of local African building industries, particularly in land-locked countries, through the application of appropriate sustainable technologies. His research has also led to the development of first-generation African urban environments at densities in excess of 125 units per hectare.

From his 2008 thematic master plan for Aksum, close to the iron-age city in Ethiopia, through Mapungubwe, to his latest project, the Laetoli African Origins Museum in Tanzania, Peter has used spatial models derived from a local tribal vernacular to communicate the story of Africa’s creative genius to the world.

As a practicing architect and as Professor of Architecture at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg for 30 years, he developed a contemporary architectural vocabulary that built on his research. Peter soon began to engage with tribal communities, acting in turn as architect, facilitator or activist. After 1994, the establishment of democracy allowed Peter to engage with a series of important Government- funded cultural heritage projects intended to help heal the deep wounds of apartheid.

The Mapungubwe Interpretation Centre (2010) is contained by two hollow cairns that evoke route-markers found in Southern African cultures; the Alexandra Heritage Centre (2000) is a rugged township building and provides a sense of community and poverty relief through training inhabitants in tourism and heritage; while the Thulumtwana Children's Facility, Gauteng (2000) was a child-owned and managed project that employed three modified shipping containers, shade structures and low enclosing walls to articulate a series of outdoor rooms and courtyards for playing and learning.

In 2010 Peter was awarded Honorary Fellowship of the American Institute of Architects and The South African Institute of Architects Gold Medal.

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