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Tilonia's architects are building up local skills-2001-11-10

Date: 
Saturday, 2001, November 10
Location: 
Author: 
Ayaz Somani

The `Barefoot Architects' of Tilonia, led by Bunker Roy, have won the Aga Khan Award for Architecture for 2001.

This prestigious international award is given every three years. According to the Aga Khan Foundation, the Barefoot Architects' programme of works in Rajasthan's rural community of Tilonia has been given this 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 Architects - local people with no formal training - belong to Tilonia's Social Work Research Centre (now known as the Barefoot College), founded by Bunker Roy in 1972.

''Their institution has had a tremendous impact on Tilonia and other outlying rural settlements, influencing every aspect of people's lives,'' notes the foundation in a press statement. ``Lifting the surrounding population out of the vicious circle of poverty and helplessness, it 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.''

The `Barefoot' philosophy is based on the belief that village communities used to develop and maintain their own store of knowledge- a practice that has been devalued in recent times and is slowly dying as people migrate to the cities to look for jobs-and deserve all support to carry on this tradition.

The Barefoot Architects have therefore tapped\promoted the practical construction skills of villagers and used mostly local building materials and techniques to create a series of buildings that enhance the vernacular tradition of the region. These include their college campus, 200-odd new homes and rainwater harvesting systems in local schools and dwellings.

The largest of these projects is the Barefoot College campus, which fuses local labour and materials throughout. The success of this approach is exemplified through the construction of the campus by an illiterate farmer from Tilonia, along with 12 other Barefoot Architects and several village women who worked as labourers and carried materials.

Plans were drawn and redrawn on the spot, based principally on a traditional courtyard format with surrounding verandahs. Cubic in form with flat roofs, the buildings were constructed using local materials such as rubble stone with lime mortar for load-bearing walls. As is the custom in Indian vernacular architecture, the courtyards are highly decorated at ground level.

The architects have 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 pump sections. The domes can be covered with a greater weight of thatch than traditional small-span structures, reducing the frequency and expense of rethatching.

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 200 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,'' notes the Foundation. ``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,'' reveals the Foundation, ``because they do not have to spend hours walking several kilometres to collect drinking water.'' All thanks to the vision of the Barefoot Architects and their leader. That's community leadership for you.


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