Archinect - News

Seeking expansion, atelier masōmī rebrands to Mariam Issoufou Architects

2024-04-02T18:50:00-04:00

The ten-year-old practice known as atelier masōmī has announced it is rebranding as Mariam Issoufou Architects.

Formed by Mariam Issoufou (née Kamara) shortly after her graduation from the University of Washington, the Niger-based practice is now a widely known entity with projects featured in exhibitions worldwide and their name included as finalists for several top industry honors, such as the 2019 Prince Claus and Royal Academy Dorfman awards, 2020 Moira Gemmill Prize for Emerging Architecture nomination, and 2022 Aga Khan Award shortlist.

In an announcement detailing the name change, the studio said: "We have seen a growing interest in our work and our intersectional approach to sustainability from South America, North America, Middle East and Europe. This expansion in the geographic scope of our work has presented an opportunity for us to open a design studio in New York, where our founder and principal, Mariam Issoufou, is building a team. Through her professorship at ETH Zu...

Yale Architecture names new scholarship in honor of Francis Kéré

2023-04-24T12:44:00-04:00

The Yale School of Architecture has just announced a new scholarship named after 2022 Pritzker Prize winner Francis Kéré in the interest of supporting African students at the school as they complete their journey to a career in architecture.

“There are so many aspiring African architects, and with a Yale education, they will be able to excel,” Kéré said. “I am the first African architect to be recognized with a Pritzker, and, thanks to the Francis Kéré Scholarship, I hope there will be many more to come.”

Kéré taught at Yale as a William B. and Charlotte Shepherd Davenport Visiting Professor in 2019 and, more recently, as the prestigious Louis I. Kahn Visiting Professor in 2022. He has remained active in the school’s academic community, which he referred to as “welcoming and vibrant” and also a “place to be.”

SoA D...

Plans revealed for atelier masōmī's Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Center in Liberia

2023-04-19T17:31:00-04:00

Details of the new Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Center for Women and Development in Monrovia, Liberia have been revealed this week by atelier masōmī, the lead designers of an all-female project that will include exhibition designs from Counterspace’s Sumayya Vally and input from local architect Karen Richards Barnes.

The project supports the EJS Center’s mission with workshops, office spaces, exhibition galleries, a café, and a library. The center was formally established on International Women’s Day in 2020 and will now play host to the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize-winning former President’s personal and professional archives.

Image courtesy atelier masōmī

The atelier’s founder, Mariam Kamara, says: “The design is a direct response to the history, climate, cultural, and architectural heritage of Liberia. The project is an introspection on the challenges faced and on the strength and hope brought about by inspirational leaders such as Madam Sirleaf. The first woman Head of State o...

Lesley Lokko tells Rowan Moore architecture's story is still 'incomplete'

2023-03-29T11:00:00-04:00

It’s a fact that Africa stands for something that comes from outside. But Africans share something that is 100% there. There is a sense, particularly among the young, that the time has come to define that something on their own terms. There is a sense that it is our time.

The woman tasked with leading the 18th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice this summer told The Guardian critic about the ideas involved in producing the Biennale, which promises a packed slate highlighting the untapped potential Africa contains.

She also spoke to Africa’s status as a continent lacking in homegrown architects and defined by “instability and invention, minimally constrained by professional structures, where the 'speed of change is likely to outstrip the ability to understand it.'”

Polymathic Nigerian designer Demas Nwoko was recently named as the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement recipient of this year's edition. The 2023 Venice Biennale opens May 20th with a special awards ceremony held at the exhibition’s Ca' Giustinian headquarters in San Marco.

Demas Nwoko receives the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement Award

2023-03-27T13:59:00-04:00

Multitalented Nigerian architect, sculptor, and designer Demas Nwoko is named the recipient of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement by the Venice Biennale in recognition of what curator Lesley Lokko described as the “polyglot nature of his talents and oeuvres and to the rather narrow interpretation of the word ‘architect’ that has arguably kept his name out of the annals.”

Nwoko's work was also commended by Lokko for his polymath abilities and commitment to sustainability, adding: “Although relatively few, Nwoko’s buildings in Nigeria fulfill two critical roles. They are forerunners of the sustainable, resource-mindful, and culturally authentic forms of expression now sweeping across the African continent — and the globe — and they point towards the future, no mean achievement for someone whose work is still largely unknown, even at home.”

Nwoko was born in the rural town of Idumuje-Ugboko and was educated at the Nigerian College of Arts, Science, and Technology. One of the orig...

The Catholic University of America and Yale School of Architecture have established a scholarship fund to honor late Ugandan architect Doreen Adengo

2023-01-24T12:11:00-05:00

A new endowment fund will provide four-year scholarship opportunities to undergraduate and graduate students pursuing an architecture education in honor of the late architect Doreen Adengo who passed away in 2022 after battling cancer. The scholarship fund has been jointly established by Yale School of Architecture and the Catholic University of America.

Born in Uganda in 1976, Adengo received her B.Arch from Catholic University in 2000 before entering Yale and graduating with an M.Arch in 2005. From there, she went on to found her own eponymous practice (Adengo Architecture) after ten years of working in offices in New York, Washington, D.C., and London.

Adengo left behind a legacy of achievement in both urbanism and architecture that helped greatly influence the development of contemporary architecture and urban design strategies while earning her the reputation and status of a role model for young practitioners.

Related on Archinect: Rethinking the global urbanism studio

She was d...

Mariam Kamara highlights a diverse group of new faculty appointments at the ETH Zurich

2022-08-17T13:23:00-04:00

Renowned West African architect Mariam Kamara will be among twelve new professors joining the faculty of the ETH Zurich, the school announced on its website late last month.

Her appointment represents a “turning point” for the ETH, as the school’s faculty is now predominantly female for the first time in its history. She is joined by another new full-time appointment to the department, Maria Conen, who had previously been on the faculty as an adjunct professor of architecture and housing.

Kamara’s previous academic experience has included stops at Brown and the Harvard GSD, where she was the Aga Khan critic for 2021. Kamara’s practice atelier masōmī is well-regarded across the design world for her innovative work surrounding memory, the elevation of non-Western architectural traditions, vernacular design, and placemaking. Recently she was named as an honorary fellow by the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada.

Previously on Archinect: Mariam Kamara on the higher aspirations of...

Mud, the world's ancient building material, deserves to have a bright future

2022-07-21T18:23:00-04:00

Even though the buildings in Sana'a are thousands of years old, they remain "terribly contemporary", says Salma Samar Damluji, co-founder of the Daw'an Mud Brick Architecture Foundation in Yemen. Damluji says it is easy to see why these mud buildings have not lost their appeal – they are well-insulated, sustainable and extremely adaptable for modern use. "It is the architecture of the future," says Damluji.

Yemen’s largest city Sana'a may even supplant Franis Kéré's home country as the world’s leading rammed earth capital, with a host of stunning, UNESCO-protected sites scattered around its Old City area. The material is one of many in an arsenal of alternatives being used to combat high temperatures and reduce global carbon footprints, a scant 5% of which can be attributed to all 54 African nations, as the Pritzker Prize winner pointed out last week in a preview of his own locally-sourced designs for the Triennale di Milano.

Earlier on Archinect: Francis Kéré and others are attempting to muddy up the rising use of concrete in West Africa

Elsewhere in the world, the BBC's Future Planet offers Austrian architect Anna Heringer’s Aga Khan Award-winning METI handmade school design in Bangladesh as a contemporary example of its successful export and application. As she and others pointed out, mud's ability to circumvent the need for more air-conditioning on a warming planet is a huge selling...

Pritzker winner Francis Kéré is on a mission to tackle misconceptions about Africa at the Triennale di Milano

2022-07-14T12:13:00-04:00

Speaking at the Triennale di Milano, which kicks off tomorrow in the Italian finance capital, Francis Kéré lamented the Western notion that his “unknown” home continent is a vast but homogeneous place when in reality, it is comprised of 54 countries and over 1,000 different language traditions.

“Instead of seeing it as a young, dynamic continent, Africa is still seen as a place that needs help,” the 2022 Pritzker Prize winner told Quartz in a recent interview. “If you close your eyes to what matters to your neighbor, then you’ll never really know them.”

The Burkina Faso-born architect, who designed a 40-foot entrance tower and cafe seating area for the Triennale around traditional African gathering customs, said his goal at the exhibition is to introduce some nuance to that misconception via the inclusion of endemic materials and building techniques whose applications represent a massive amount of untapped potential.

Related on Archinect: Mariam Kamara on the higher aspirations of ...

The new Bët-bi Museum by atelier masōmī will continue a shift toward cultural justice in Senegal

2022-05-17T12:32:00-04:00

A historic new museum is set to take shape in West Africa, the vision of the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation and designer Mariam Kamara of Niger’s atelier masōmī.

Bët-bi is said to be the first institution dedicated to the (temporary) collection and display of repatriated objects taken from their native lands in a reversal of controversial practices which have been at the heart of many Western museum operations since their beginnings in Colonialism.

Image courtesy atelier masōmī

The studio beat out four other firms based in Africa for the commission, including Rwanda’s MASS Design Group and the Moroccan firm Aziza Chaouni Projects.

Located in the Kaolack region of southern Senegal, Bët-bi (or “The Eye” in Wolof) aims to position itself as an intermediary between Western art-collecting institutions and surrounding nations in addition to serving in its functional capacity as an educational fount to the area. In this regard, its mission and scope are similar to that of the planned Ed...

Pritzker Prize winner Diébédo Francis Kéré on why his childhood is keeping him motivated

2022-03-22T18:01:00-04:00

I never saw myself connected to this big thing. I was just using my skills to create comfortable spaces and beautiful schools and housing for my people. No, I never dreamed to see this work connected with Pritzker. No, no, never.

NPR’s Michel Martin got the newest Pritzker laureate and recently-named Dakar Goethe Institute designer to harken back to his childhood village in Burkina Faso, which he credited as a strong influence beginning with his educational experiences in darkened classrooms that frequently hovered around 100 degrees.

Recently on Archinect: Francis Kéré named 2022 Pritzker Prize winner

“Being in the village, you're thinking about big buildings, glass and whatever, far away,” Kéré told NPR. “And so in Burkina, that is it. The focus is the Western. But in my case, it's like you just have, you know, a tradition, which is strong, which has skills, which has some great things that I relate to the environment, to the ecology […] but people don't see it [as if] it has a value. And when we started, it cost me a lot of energy to really convince [them]. But a couple of years ago, people started to see that what I'm doing was the good solution.”

Related on Archinect: Francis Kéré and others are attempt...

Francis Kéré named 2022 Pritzker Prize winner

2022-03-15T10:00:00-04:00

Diébédo Francis Kéré has been awarded the 2022 Pritzker Architecture Prize, widely considered one of the industry's highest honors.

"Francis Kéré has found brilliant, inspiring and game-changing ways to answer these questions over the last decades," said the jury citation for the award. "His cultural sensitivity not only delivers social and environmental justice, but guides his entire process, in the awareness that it is the path towards the legitimacy of a building in a community. He knows, from within, that architecture is not about the object but the objective; not the product, but the process."

Born in Gando, Burkina Faso in 1965, Kéré studied architecture at the Technical University of Berlin. In 2005, while living in Berlin, he set up Kéré Architecture and has since designed a portfolio of notable works, including the 2017 Serpentine Pavilion, installations at Coachella, and a pavilion for the Tip...

Kéré Architecture breaks ground on new Goethe Institute center in Dakar

2022-02-23T15:49:00-05:00

Senegal is taking a big step towards further establishing itself as an architectural capital thanks to Francis Kéré’s design for the Goethe Institute that has officially broken ground in Dakar.

The 56-year-old architect was on hand Wednesday for a ceremony which included German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and the Goethe Institute’s Carola Lentz.

Exterior view of the Goethe Institute. Rendering by Goethe Institute.

Speaking at the ceremony, the architect mentioned the shared values that both he and the Institute share, stating that his climate-oriented approach to the project was met with an “open and sympathetic” response that encouraged him to “take things further” in a collaborative effort later outlined by Steinmeier.

Architect Francis Kéré, the Senegalese artist Baaba Mal, Senegalese Minister of Town Planning and Public Hygiene Abdoulaye Saydou Sow, and Federal President of Germany Frank-Walter Steinmeier. Image courtesy Goethe Institute.

“I am optimistic that Africa and E...

Oliver Wainwright obsesses over the distinctive architecture of Dakar

2022-01-14T14:40:00-05:00

Their obsessive geometrical composition was an attempt to answer the call of Senegal’s first president, the poet Léopold Sédar Senghor, for a national style that he curiously termed “asymmetrical parallelism”. Senghor never quite defined what this brave new style should look like, but he spoke vaguely of “a diversified repetition of rhythm in time and space”. Forceful, faceted forms and strong, rhythmic geometries became the vogue.

Dakar is known as a regional hub of modernism, which is equally the product of Senghor’s arts-centered vision and of its past colonial linkage. Wainwright traced the history of post-independence architecture in Senegal from the 1974 International Fair to Abdoulaye Wade’s controversial outsized African Renaissance Monument in Ouakam.

The Guardian critic appeared to be impressed by the city’s variety of styles and influences, offering Philipp Meuser and Adil Dalbai’s guide to the region as his bible and saying that it “offers a glimmer of hope from a new generation of young architects and engineers rediscovering vernacular techniques.”

“It is the postcolonial architecture of the 1970s and 80s that really stands out for its originality, much of it by Senegalese architects Cheikh Ngom and Pierre Goudiaby Atepa, as well as France’s Henri Chomette. They all developed a distinctive form of modernism in tune with President Senghor’s ideas of asymmetrical parallelism. Monolithic tapering p...

Francis Kéré and others are attempting to muddy up the rising use of concrete in West Africa

2021-11-22T15:24:00-05:00

Architects, officials, and villagers confirm the trend: People are discarding traditional materials, mostly mud, in favor of concrete, as soon as they can afford it. As living standards increase making concrete more accessible, some of the world’s hottest, poorest landscapes are rapidly morphing from brown to cinder block grey.

Architects like Francis Kéré have been attempting to buck the trend of using concrete by experimenting with upgraded versions of terrestrial materials like mud bricks that simultaneously provide tools for community-building in developing countries like Burkina Faso.

Facade detail of Kéré Architecture's Burkina Institute of Technology. Photo: Jaime Herraiz.

The ancient material is much more heat-adaptable when compared to concrete, which is increasingly valuable in an area whose number of extreme heat days is expected to rapidly increase over the next three decades due to climate change.

“It’s a matter of time, it’s a matter of belief. It’s a matter of political will,” Kéré, told National Geographic. “But there’s a lot of accumulated knowledge now. In 10 years, you’re going to be surprised by our success.”

Francis Kéré's latest project brings a termite-inspired design to the Kenyan lowlands

2021-07-01T14:56:00-04:00

A new polytechnic training campus has sprung up in Kenya’s Great Rift Valley, standing out in the sprawling lowlands region thanks to three terracotta-colored ventilation towers that took their inspiration from termite colonies in the growing East African technology hub.

Image © Kéré Architecture

Located on the banks of Lake Turkana, the new Startup Lions campus will provide education and jobs training for young Kenyans, the largest demographic group driving population growth in the country expected to double in size by 2050.

Image © Startup Lions

Kéré Architecture is responsible for the campus plan, which includes housing and workstation spaces for 200 students at the ICT facility. Outdoor classrooms shaded by a grove of pergolas and the profile of thee large cooling towers that will mitigate the Valley’s extreme heat and harmful desert sand, making learning easier in a scheme aimed at collaboration.

Image © Kéré Architecture

The German-based firm has been very active in African dev...

Kéré Architecture's Benin National Assembly is inspired by the West African palaver tree

2021-02-09T14:58:00-05:00

Kéré Architecture has revealed its design for the parliament of the Republic of Benin's new national assembly building. According to the architects, "the project takes inspiration from the palaver tree, the age-old West African tradition of meeting under a tree to make consensual decisions in the interest of a community."

The assembly hall is located on the ground level. The "crown" holds the offices and auxiliary spaces, which are set back from the deep facade to filter sunlight. The "trunk" is hollow and creates a central courtyard that facilitates circulation and natural ventilation throughout the space. A central spiral staircase connects the ground and upper levels, and the top-level roof terrace offers panoramic views of the surrounding cityscape.

A large portion of the site will be dedicated to a public park that will display Benin's native flora in addition to providing new recreation space. Moreover, new government service facilities will be integrated into the park's top...

World's first 3D-printed school due to rise in Madagascar

2021-02-05T11:21:00-05:00

The world’s first 3D-printed school will soon rise on the African island nation of Madagascar. With a speedy construction timeline and a process that can be easily replicated, the school could become a new model for providing much-needed educational spaces in underresourced communities.

The project was designed by Studio Mortazavi, an architecture firm based in San Francisco and Lisbon, in collaboration with Thinking Huts, a nonprofit aiming to increase global access to education through 3D printing, reports Fast Company.

Moreover, according to Fast Company, architect Amir Mortazavi, outlining the benefits of 3D-printing when there is a shortage of local labor, said: "We can build these schools in less than a week, including the foundation and all the electrical and plumbing work that’s involved. Something like this would typically take months, if not even longer."

The HBCU Africa Architecture Lecture series brings the voices of Black architects and the African Continent together for representation and discourse

2021-02-04T17:52:00-05:00

Here at Archinect, we highlight academic events and lectures that provide insight and access to public programming created by architecture schools. Year after year, these events welcome various leaders and innovators within architecture, design, and its adjacent fields of study. While in-person events are put on hold, the ability to engage and invite a global audience is possible thanks to virtual events outlets. 2021 welcomes an exciting series of talks, panels, and lectures that we've featured in our 2021 Get Lectured series and Archinect's Virtual Event Guide. However, an upcoming lecture series creates an opportunity for a much-needed platform for Black design professionals to share their work, expertise, and initiatives for change.

Archinect Feature by Sean Joyner: "Discovering a Black Aesthetic in Architecture" — An Investigation by Woodbury Grad Demar Matthews. Image courtesy of Demar Matthews

February is Black History month, and the rise in promoting and highlighting Black ex...

'Undoing of objectification:' Adjaye Associates unveils design for new Edo Museum of West African Art

2020-11-16T13:55:00-05:00

The three-story building, designed by David Adjaye, looks almost like a palace from the ancient Kingdom of Benin. On Friday, the architect, the British Museum and the Nigerian authorities also announced a $4 million archaeology project to excavate the site of the planned museum, and other parts of Benin City, to uncover ancient remains including parts of the city walls.

In October 2019, Adjaye Associates was selected to design a new museum to house historic artifacts looted by colonial powers in Benin City, modern-day Nigeria. Designs for this planned Edo Museum of West African Art were unveiled on Friday.

"We are proposing an undoing of the objectification that has happened in the West through full reconstruction," said Ghanaian-British architect David Adjaye in a statement. "The new museum design reconstructs the inhabitation of these forms as pavilions that enable the recontextualization of artefacts. Decoupling from the Western museum model, this museum will perform as a reteaching tool — a place to instill an understanding of the magnitude and importance of these civilizations and cultures."

Image: Adjaye Associates

"Adjacent to the Oba’s Palace, the new EMOWAA draws inspiration from its historical architectural typologies and establishes its own courtyard in the form of a public garden, exhibiting a variety of indigenous flora and a canopy tha...

Mariam Kamara on the higher aspirations of African architects

2020-08-19T14:13:00-04:00

[...] Kamara is mounting a quietly radical revolt against the “Western dictatorship over our space,” which still insists that African architects should only build clinics and rural schools, never addressing higher aspirations. For Kamara, that attitude is not just constraining, it’s an affront to the humanity of the place she comes from and the people for whom she builds. She prefers instead “to elevate lived experience,” to “dare to do something that would make someone dream.”

The New York Times in conversation with Mariam Kamara, the founder of Niger/Rhode Island-based architecture and research practice atelier masōmī.

Hikma Religious and Secular Complex in Dadaji, Niger by atelier masōmī + Studio Chahar. Photo: James Wang, Mariama Kah.

Among other distinctions, Kamara was one of the 2017 LafargeHolcim Middle East + Africa Award winners, David Adjaye's 2018-19 Rolex Arts Initiative protégée, a Moira Gemmill Prize for Emerging Architecture nominee, the 2019 Prince Claus Award laureate, and more recently, announced as a participant for the 17th Architecture Biennale in Venice.

Montreal's CCA to study postcolonial perspectives on the architecture of the African continent

2019-07-29T13:12:00-04:00

The Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) is embarking on a new initiative aimed at understanding "architecture's historical role in decolonization, neocolonialism, globalization, and their manifestations" across the African continent, according to a recent announcement.

The focus on Africa's architecture represents a desire on the part of CCA to expand scholarly research efforts by reconsidering its archives in order to "challenge the reliance on Western sources by looking beyond institutional archives to others constructed around single buildings, international organizations, urban spaces, new policies, statistics, laws, photography, financial programs, and philosophical, intellectual, or cultural propositions."

Starting in October 2019, CCA will host an 18-month research effort in collaboration with 10 Andrew W. Mellon Foundation researchers to undertake this challenge. The scholars will develop projects that "seek to analyze and historicize the ways in which architecture manif...

Francis Kéré fashions arts pavilion from pine logs

2019-07-12T15:12:00-04:00

Architect Francis Kéré has completed work on Xylem, a new pavilion at the Tippet Rise Art Center in Montana that is fashioned from a collection of tree trunks.

The 2,100-square-foot pavilion, described as "a quiet place to contemplate nature" by the organizers, draws inspiration from the wooden and straw toguna structures in West Africa's Dogon communities. In their native context, togunas are seen as sacred structures and are often located at the center of each village where they host communal discussions and debates. Designed with squat proportions that force visitors to sit down when inhabiting the space, the traditional structures play a vital role in the governance and everyday life of their respective villages.

Interior view of the pavilion, which is made up of from ponderosa and lodgepole pine logs. Image courtesy of Iwan Baan, Tippet Rise Art Center.

For the pavilion in Montana, Kéré has created a lively and textured space built entirely from the logs of ponderosa and lodge...

Its curves recall the vernacular found in southern Senegal's Casamance

2018-12-09T20:41:00-05:00

The idea of establishing the museum dates back more than 50 years, to Senegal's late poet-president, Léopold Sédar Senghor. Along with Martinican writer Aimé Césaire, Senghor was a creative force behind the philosophy of Négritude, which opposed the imposition of French culture on colonies in Africa and the Caribbean.

Senegal's new Musée des Civilisations noires opens this week in the capital, Dakar.

Anyone know who the architect is? Nothing I could find/Google Translate seems to indicate. Perhaps, some nameless bureaucratic office or Chinese ExtraStateCraft(er)?

First English-isiZulu architectural dictionary explains indigenous South African architecture

2017-12-11T14:03:00-05:00

Can you tell the difference between a Brakdak and an Afdak, a Sekwere or a Caka? Do you know your Domba hut from your Zulu one? An Inqolobane from an Indlu yezikhali? Give yourself a pat on the back if you do. Truly, you deserve it. However, don't worry too much if you can't, as there's a new English-isiZulu architectural dictionary, just published by UKZN Press, which contains more than 1200 entries of local architectural terms.

"I set out to study independent vernacular architecture in the 1970s, not realizing that a multitude of readings and meanings would emerge out of it," the book's co-author Franco Frescura, a former Professor and Chair of Architecture at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, tells HuffPost South Africa. "As I explored, many of the people I met taught me how to read various aspects of rural architecture — like where do you locate the kitchen, where do you place the wives in polygamous housing? And then I realized the value of the research."