Aga Khan Award for Architecture 2001

Description

The "Barefoot" philosophy is based on the belief that village communities used to develop and maintain their own store of knowledge, which has been devalued in recent times and is slowly dying as people migrate to the cities to look for jobs. In 1972, this philosophy inspired the founding of the Social Work Research Centre (SWRC), now known as the "Barefoot College", in Tilonia, a rural community in the Indian state of Rajasthan.

The founder and director of the college, Bunker Roy, wanted to break away from the Indian social-work tradition, which had an urban, middle-class and academic orientation, to create a programme that respected local skills, providing training and upgrading to help people help themselves. Over the years, the centre has worked with local teachers, health-care providers, solar engineers and hand-pump mechanics in a comprehensive development plan, implemented with the rural poor for the rural poor. These programmes have led to a number of significant building projects realized by the "Barefoot Architects" - local members of the college staff. The largest of these projects is a campus for the college, which fuses local labour and materials throughout. The success of this approach is exemplified in the construction process of the campus. A young architect, Neehar Raina, prepared the architectural layout, and an illiterate farmer from Tilonia, along with twelve other Barefoot Architects, constructed the buildings. With the help of Neehar Raina's drawings, these Barefoot Architects, most of whom have no formal education, were able to build the complete campus and lay down its services. They were assisted by several village women who not only worked as labourers, but also participated actively in the day-to-day decisions about techniques used in the building process. Sometimes, the plans were drawn and redrawn on the spot to accommodate traditional building techniques that were not featured in the original design. The buildings are based principally on a traditional courtyard format with surrounding circulation verandas. Cubic in form with flat roofs, the buildings were constructed using local materials such as rubble stone with lime mortar for load-bearing walls, and large stone slabs for the roof. As is the custom in Indian vernacular architecture, the courtyards are highly decorated at ground level.

The architects also found numerous applications for Buckminster Fuller's geodesic dome. Traditional housing in desert areas has sometimes used wood as a material, but this has become a scarce resource. Geodesic domes, however, are easily fabricated from scrap metal, which is readily available from discarded agricultural implements, bullock carts and pumps sections. The domes can be covered with a greater weight of thatch than traditional small-span structures, reducing the frequency and expense of re-thatching. The use of geodesic domes has also given rise to expertise in building emergency structures, including relief housing.

Through its Homes for the Homeless programme, the college has provided more than two hundred basic, low-cost dwellings in surrounding villages. Most of the buildings were constructed from earth-brick, but people with greater economic resources used other materials, including rubble stone and lime mortar. The houses have proved to be extremely functional and a great improvement on previous living conditions.

Another of the college's projects is the development of structures to harvest rainwater, which have been installed at the campus and in schools throughout the region. In rural areas, large-scale efforts to provide water are typically made by tapping groundwater sources - an expensive, short-term process that often yields brackish water. Rainwater-harvesting structures, based on tried-and-tested rural technologies, gather water from flat rooftops and channel it to storage tanks, usually situated underground. The system is inexpensive, provides a year-round water supply and has led to wasteland reclamation. In several rural primary schools, the attendance of girls has improved because they do not have to spend hours walking several kilometres to collect drinking water.

The Barefoot College has had a tremendous impact on Tilonia and other outlying rural settlements, influencing every aspect of people's lives. Lifting the surrounding population out of the vicious circle of poverty and helplessness, the college has facilitated a revival of traditional technologies and applied them on a wider scale to solve problems that have baffled scientists, engineers, environmentalists and politicians for years.

Jury Citation

This programme of works was given an Award for its integration of social, ecological, cultural and educational elements in such a way as to aid rural development while promoting the architectural traditions of the region. The Barefoot College comprises a unique experiment in employing rural people to implement local social-aid programmes. Its utilization and improvement of the practical construction skills of villagers has led to the creation of buildings that enhance the vernacular tradition of the region. As a result, the Barefoot Architects - local people with no formal training - have been able to build a college campus with buildings that combine advanced techniques and traditional building materials, using sustainable technologies such as rainwater harvesting and solar power. The architects have been able to apply and spread their skills in the surrounding community, installing rainwater harvesting systems in local schools and building two hundred new homes, to upgrade rural living conditions.