pictures can be found here:

https://drive.google.com/drive...

GENERAL INFORMATION:

Built by: C-re-aid NGO

Partner: Global Bike

Year: 2018

Location: Mikocheni, Tanzania

Surface: 60m2Price: €4500

Architect: Thomas Stoffelen, Samantha Welby

Material: CEB (compressed earth blocks)

EXPLANATION:

C-re-aid’s second Bike Shop building, sponsored by the Canadian organisation Global Bike, provides a place for the women of the village of Mikocheni to work on and store bikes. A big shaded workspace is combined with a secure indoor space where bikes and spare parts can be stored, yet are easily accessible when needed.

The building is located in a remote Massai village with nor electricity nor streaming water. Here, the women often have to overcome big distances to have access to food or basic supplies. Global Bike therefore provides the women with bikes to make these daily tasks easier. However, bikes are easily damages on the bad roads in the village. That is why Global Bike also invests in bike shops, places where they teach the women how to repair their bikes and provide them with the spare parts. This way, the women can learn to help themselves and become independent. 

The design of the second Bike Shop mainly focusses on the outdoor covered space, since this will be the area that will be used most often. It is a place where the women can meet and, protected against the burning sun, work together on fixing bikes. Yet it is a place that can also be used for meetings, classes or even celebrations. The roof structure exists out of a sloped roof that makes sure water is removed quickly during heavy rains, yet allows enough ventilation at the top. The enclosed indoor part of the building has a brick pattern with openings at the top of the walls, which also allows ventilation but also light to enter without creating security problems. The organisation of the building is kept simple, with an area designated for a small shop to sell spare parts and two bigger storage areas, to allow a flexible use of the building. The main wooden beams of the roof structure each consist out of two beams placed together with 15cm in between. This way they become stronger, but also cover the top parts of the walls with the triangles from the outside and inside, giving them a finished and closed off appearance. Some basic furniture is provided for the small shop and two beams, integrated in the ring beam structure, make it possible to hang the bikes and thus storing much more of them.

C-Re-Aid tries to promote sustainable building techniques and this building is a prototype for showing how to build with CEB’s (compressed earth bricks). The CEB’s are made out of the soil from the construction site and lime, pressed together with a manual press and dried in the sun. This makes them very cheap and sustainable, since no transport of raw building materials is needed and no wood needs to be cut for burning the bricks. Using lime instead of cement makes the bricks also more sustainable and ideal against the saltine soil in the village. The bricks are very strong and waterproof, and we already see the local community showing an interest in using them. Using local materials and basic building tools, we tried to show them al alternative way of cheap yet sustainable building.