MASS Design Group

THREAD: MASS partners with sustainable recycling venture in Haiti

2012-02-03T11:08:00.000-08:00

Claire Lubell - holds a BS.Arch from the University of Waterloo School of Architecture. She lived in Haiti this fall as a MASS Design Fellow.

New Stories! Continued: Training the Next Generation of Rwandan Architects

2011-12-15T06:57:00.000-08:00

To recap from the previous post, the Rwandan population is expected to double by 2020, reaching a total of 16 million in the size of Maryland. In preparation for this population boom, the Vision 2020 Plan establishes a framework for Rwanda’s development that aspires to transform Rwanda’s economy into a middle income state, which in turn necessitates a restructuring of the built environment. However, the amount of development is greatly disproportionate to the number of educated and licensed designers. Currently, there are no architecture graduate programs in Rwanda and no licensing program for architects.

Since 2008, MASS Design Group’s designers, Sierra Bainbridge and Garret Gantner, have worked hard to develop the architecture program at the Kigali Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) into a commonwealth accredited program. During the equivalent of KIST’s summer break, MASS had the pleasure of working with 4 aspiring Rwandan architects; you heard the stories written by Jacques and JP, now hear from the other two!

What interested you in enrolling for architecture school?
I have been always interested in construction and everything that goes with. My interest grew as years went by because what I imagined architecture was, became more interesting than I couldn’t believe through my university years. Now I’m interested more than ever in seeing an idea became a reality (a building) and that the whole community can benefit from that idea. I want to further my studies in Interior Design because the way we make our interior look is what make our life more pleasant to live!

Why did you apply for an internship at MASS Design Group?
After Mrs Sierra and Mr Garret presented at KIST what Mass was about and some of their projects and as I have heard about the Butaro Hospital; the design and ideas behind it, I felt like I want to be part of that team and see how they work because I personally am interested in improving people’s lives through architecture. I thought Mass Group was the best place for me to learn from different people with different ideas because at the end of my 2nd year I did my internship in an office with one architect and there weren’t much discussion. But in Mass, I found in there the team spirit, the sharing of ideas that have an impact on people’s lives and every new and good idea is considered. I knew that they were working on hospitals and I felt tempted and I enrolled and thank God they took me!

What did you work on during your 10 weeks with MASS?
During the first weeks I was working on the post occupancy survey for Butaro hospital. I worked on the weather station and on the Air Quality Infection Control Survey for the maternity and the pediatrics wards. In last weeks, I was mainly working on the Nyanza hospital; correcting some drawings and I also worked on door and wall details.

What do you envision your roll to be in the architectural community of Rwanda once you graduate?
Once I graduate, I will try my best to be the in between for the population and the government or the people with the money. But I have to work first on my speaking skills because I don’t think I am good at that! I want that people coming in Rwanda in 10 or 15 years to come, see the change and the improvement in our way of living through the architecture of places that we occupy. Not only rich people have right to our ideas as architects, also the whole community has to benefit from us. We are here for them. A nation is said to be developed based on people’s everyday’s life. And this goes with the places where the population do live. Developing a nation is improving people’s lives. Improving people’s lives is improving their way of living by improving the places they live in.

What interested you in enrolling for architecture school?
First of all, design is my passion. From my primary school, I liked to draw everything I saw on my way and I used to think about how I should change them until my Senior 6, when I was allowed to choose the faculty to follow. I found that my country needs architects including me. I need to participate in finding solutions of my country problems in architecture designing by context.

Why did you apply for an internship at MASS Design Group?
From the beginning of semester 1 until the end of semester 2 at KIST, I liked comments given by all the guys from Mass- helpful and useful. I like the fact that mass works with NGOs which vise to a large community interest such as, PIH and APIE. I like the way Mass designs for finding almost all solutions, not solutions that cause other problems. For example, Mass Design Group has hospital design solutions for fighting against airborne diseases.

What did you work on during your 10 weeks with MASS?
I helped with making woven chairs, cushions, and pillow designs for the Mass office. I helped doing triangulation at Butaro hospital below Men’s ward where a path from Butaro housing had to get the hospital. I did a punchlist for Girubuntu primary school. I designed built-in furniture for Butaro housing.

Why do you think design is important as Rwanda looks to enhance it’s role in the global market?
When I hear a word design, I understand 4 major things: context, functionality, speciality and innovation. Once we will be able to make our own things without copying from anywhere else, special and functional this can be considerable on the global market.

For more information about the architecture department at the Kigali Institute of Science and Technology:

http://www.kist.ac.rw/index.php/faculties/160
http://rwanda-arcbox.blogspot.com/
Sarah Mohland - holds an M.Arch from Montana State University- Bozeman. She is living in Kigali as a MASS Design Fellow.

MASS IMPACT: Constructing Butaro Doctors' Housing, Burera, Rwanda

2011-12-07T07:57:00.000-08:00

Follow-up with Libby, at Rethink Relief

2011-10-31T08:14:00.000-07:00

Rethink Relief, a design workshop at the Faculty of Industrial Design at TU-Delft, has come to an end and it was a productive week for all involved. We mixed idea generation and design with insightful lectures about the design process and relief-related research going on at TU-Delft. On Friday we wrapped up with presentations of each team’s work, which were attended by faculty and students from all over the university.

My team presented our ideas for a more mobile, transferable water system. The driving force behind our design is the need to adapt rainwater catchment systems to any type of shelter. We want to pair a tarp with a gutter connected to many individual pipes that can be assembled over either a tent or a more permanent roofing system. Then the user can connect the pipes to any number of small water containers, such as plastic “pillow” bags, jerry cans, or terra cotta pots, which are easy to carry around. Reusable plastic bags would be an ideal way to disinfect the water with UV light. The containers can finally be stockpiled in larger rigid containers, such as the uniformly sized plywood boxes that Doctors Without Borders uses to transport supplies to relief camps. In this way, water could be available during dry periods in modestly-sized containers that can be used or shared easily.

This is still a concept that needs extensive development. My teammates David, Christoffer, Joana and I hope to keep collaborating in the future to develop the idea and get other people on board to help us make it a reality. Rethink Relief showed us that there is an extensive network of innovators interested in these solutions, and we need to tap into this network if we want to make real changes to the living conditions of people in relief camps and beyond!

The most important lecture of the week, for me, was that which asked the question “What are we designing for?” Lecturer Amy Smith of D-Lab started the presentation by saying, “THERE ARE NO SOLUTIONS, THERE ARE ONLY TRADE-OFFS.” The trade-offs can occur among the following needs, to name just a few: Affordability, Usability, Manufacturability, and Sustainability.

And finally, my favorite trade-off: Failure. It seems counterintuitive at first to design for failure, but as a structural engineer you could say this is my primary concern. The challenge is to think about how the product or structure might fail, then make sure it fails in the safest way possible and the way that is easiest to fix again – because no matter what you might hope, it WILL fail. In an earthquake, for example, our goal is to make sure the building does not collapse and kill people. This does not mean the building won’t be damaged – there are no earthquake-proof buildings, only earthquake-resistant buildings. It is the engineer’s job to ensure that the building sustains the least catastrophic damage, rather than no damage at all.

A key motivator in designing our rainwater-collection system is to make sure it is easy to fix when it fails. There should be as few components as possible, and each component should be made of cheap, easily available materials that can be replaced quickly. For example, the pipes transferring rainwater to individual containers could be made of a narrow plastic tape that is used in countries like India for irrigation. The tape usually lasts for only a couple of years before it starts to break down, but its low-cost design makes it possible for people to afford it. It doesn’t require a large investment, yet it is still an effective material with which to collect rainwater!

Another lesson learned this week: sometimes the best solutions are so simple that we overlook them. Our culture’s drive to advance technology is often counter-intuitive to the needs of a relief or development situation. People need simple ways to obtain drinking water, shelter, food, and education, and these methods must be sustainable and applicable to any situation in which those people might find themselves. Refugees in relief camps can be stuck in those “temporary” camps for 10 years, 20 years, or their whole lives. By that time, their home is not a camp anymore: it is a slum. Engineers, architects, doctors, social workers, and other innovators have a duty to help these people now – not later, when they might be able to leave the camp. We simply don’t know when “later” will be, if it ever arrives, and we have little control over the politics driving that opportunity. So let’s work to simply and effectively improve human living environments as they are right now.

Libby Hsu- received a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and two master’s degrees in high performance structures and building technology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She now is bringing her engineering experience to MASS.

MASS member, Libby, involved with Rethink Relief

2011-10-25T14:14:00.000-07:00

Greetings from the Delft Institute of Technology in the Netherlands! I am here for a weeklong design workshop called Rethink Relief, the purpose of which is to build bridges between relief and development with appropriate design and technology. The workshop is held in part by D-Lab at MIT (d-lab.mit.edu), my alma mater. I’m going to share a few details of my time here for you!

When a natural disaster or political upheaval occurs, the conditions into which people are forced can last far longer than anyone anticipates. A relief organization might pass out tents, food, clean water, medicine, and other resources. But tents do not last more than six months, and one cannot rely on processed food flown in to a campsite forever. What if there is no land to grow one’s own food, or fuel with which to cook unprocessed food? What if the water source runs out? What happens when a tent disintegrates but there is nowhere else to go, and no new tents? What if an oppressive government forces relief organizations to leave, taking all their medicine and supplies with them?

Darfur Refugee Camp in Chad

Sometimes after a catastrophe, people become permanently stuck in the relief camps, which turn into slums that grow indefinitely. International development organizations have no control over the politics that may confine these people to any given area. But they CAN figure out ways to improve quality of life there for the long term, after relief organizations have moved on to the next disaster.

Or what if the two entities could join forces to do a better job of implementing both relief AND development in one go? Elizabeth Ferris of the Brookings Institute wrote, “In spite of hundreds of articles, countless speeches, and numerous conferences, the gap between relief and development is still far from being overcome.” We are gathered here at Rethink Relief this week to generate ideas and form lasting connections that will work to bridge this divide.

There are 25 people from around the world at the workshop. They come from a variety of backgrounds: Doctors Without Borders, universities, NGOs, engineering companies, and more. Some have experience in relief work; others, like myself, have more of a background in international development. I am one of three structural engineers, and there are also industrial designers, doctors, relief workers, entrepreneurs, economists, social workers, and others whose work cannot possibly be confined to just one of these disciplines.

As you can imagine, Rethink Relief is a fantastic opportunity to meet others who share MASS’s philosophy of Well-Built Environments! During the first two days of the workshop, we have gotten to know each other and formed teams to work on individual issues affecting relocated populations. My team has decided to focus on the issue of potable water storage and distribution. Of course, clean water is crucial to maintaining health in a relief camp, and healthy people have time and energy to improve other aspects of their lives. You could argue that clean water is the first step to overcoming all other hardships.

Rainwater catchment has been studied by many different people over the years. However, catchment systems often involve large clay or plastic tanks that are not easily moved, and can also be expensive (see photo below). In a temporary housing situation, people need cheaper and more portable solutions for storing and sharing water. Ideally, this storage design would be versatile enough for people to expand, take with them when they leave, or transfer to a more permanent home on the same site. Since one of our team members is from Uganda and is sharing his own experience with obtaining clean water, we are focusing our design on a system that might work well in a climate like Uganda’s.

Rain Water Harvesting Tank

Stay tuned for an update on our work at the end of the week! For now, I leave you with these questions to think about: What is the proper role of engineers and designers in a relief situation? How can we design solutions to improve people’s quality of life when they are in a temporary housing situation that we fear might become permanent? And how will access to clean water help a relief camp’s inhabitants create a Well-Built Environment for themselves?

Libby Hsu- received a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and two master’s degrees in high performance structures and building technology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She now is bringing her engineering experience to MASS.

Jennifer's Update from Kigali

2011-09-27T08:36:00.000-07:00

I had never been to Africa before joining MASS, but I have now been in Rwanda for five weeks as a new MASS Design Fellow in the capital city, Kigali. For the next few months, I’ll be working on a renovation and addition to the district maternity hospital located in Nyanza. I am excited to be working on a project that is part renovation and part new addition, as this is my area of experience from working in the United States. Hospital design is new to me, but I am learning a lot about it with each passing week.

Even though modernization in Rwanda is well underway, particularly in the large cities, many of the smaller cities and towns do not yet have the buildings or equipment needed to provide optimal maternal and neonatal care. Located in the Southern Province of Rwanda and formerly the home of the Rwandan kings, Nyanza is now the home of a district hospital which supports many smaller healthcare facilities and clinics in the area.

The existing maternity hospital building in Nyanza was built in 1931 by the Belgians. The exterior of the building has some really nice tectonic details, with a heavy stonework base, elegant thin concrete lintels, and a spacious loggia along each wing (shown below). The building was sturdily constructed and has a great deal of potential, but the interior needs some work to rehabilitate it and convert some of the existing spaces to different functions, such as a new neonatal intensive care unit. We are also designing several new buildings to increase the capacity of the hospital and provide a new operating room and pediatrics ward. Below is a photo of one of the small rooms where birthing currently occurs (it is not much bigger than what you see in the photo).

It is exciting to be working with MASS and UNICEF to bring this building up to better and safer conditions and construct new buildings that can provide the space and equipment that is needed here. One strategy that we have been excited to implement with this project is the use of solar chimneys to encourage ventilation, especially in the ward spaces. We recently completed our Schematic Design phase, and are now beginning Construction Documents.

On the drive to Nyanza and back, I have been struck by the fact that every square acre of Rwanda seems to be cultivated. There are 10 million people in a country the size of Maryland (and extremely few apartments or high-rises, which are found only in the capital). That’s 10 million people living in mostly individual homes with their own plots of land to farm in a very small country. As you drive through Rwanda, it seems like every piece of hill or valley you can see is terraced or planted or somehow being lived on. It is also interesting to actually see the people working on the land; most large American farms are planted, watered, and harvested by machine these days, but in Rwanda, you see men, women, and children bending over in the fields to sow seeds or collect the harvest. There is a close relationship between the people and the land.

One thing that I have learned after living in Rwanda for a while is what it is like to look different from the vast majority, and to be conspicuous wherever you go. But the stares you may get from the local people are more the result of curiosity than anything else, and strangers will smile and say hello to you when you pass by. Small children will wave and say “muzungu!” which means foreigner. Sometimes they run up to give you a high-five or handshake.

It actually amazes me how fast you can assimilate to a new situation. I’ve been here only a short time, but I have been learning the language quickly and can communicate with most people using a mix of Kinyarwandan, English, and French. Kinyarwandan, a Bantu language, can be difficult to learn because its sounds and structure are so different from English or the Romance languages, but it is very rewarding to be able to communicate with local people in their own language. It is also easier to pick it up when you use it every day to talk to store owners or moto taxi drivers.

My time here so far has definitely been invigorating, and I can honestly say that I learn something new (or several new things) every day, whether it involves architecture, preservation, healthcare, history, politics, culture, or language. I look forward to the next year in Kigali and all the experiences it will provide.

Jennifer Gaugler - holds a B.Arch from MIT and an M.Arch from Tulane. She is living in Kigali as a MASS Design Fellow.

Updates from Our Team in Haiti

2011-08-10T06:07:00.000-07:00

We have broken ground on our first project in Haiti. This past week we began construction of a small shelter to house our CSEB press during the fabrication of the 36,000 compressed stabilized earth blocks that will be used to build the hospital here at GHESKIO’s northern site in Tabarre. In spite of its small size, this shelter represents a significant milestone for MASS in Haiti. This is not simply because it is the first built structure, but because we have navigated through language barriers, procured materials and tools, and hired a contractor and crew. It is gratifying to be moving forward on this initial phase of work in Haiti.

We retrieved the Auram CSEB (compressed stabilized earth block) press last week and begin a 3-week CSEB training workshop on Friday. To that end, we are excited to welcome Satprem and Amandine from the Auroville Earth Institute to Haiti. They will spend three weeks here with MASS running CSEB construction and design workshops, overseeing our first block-making attempts and advising on current and future projects that will incorporate this low-cost, locally available construction material. They bring 25 years of experience building with earth blocks in India and have given workshops all over the world – in other words, they are an amazing asset to our work here.

Our first few weeks in Haiti have seen a number of other exciting developments as well. We have established an office at the site of the TB Hospital we will be building for GHESKIO. From this location we can be directly involved in the blockmaking and have easy access to personnel from GHESKIO. We also made visits to two project sites in the heart of Port-au-Prince. The first was to the community of Cité de Dieu (City of God) where we hope to begin a long-term earthquake-resistant housing and infrastructure project with the support of GHESKIO and others. The second visit was to GHESKIO’s centre-ville location, where we met with Dr. Pape and laid the groundwork for a number of upcoming projects. We also spent a couple of days in Mirebalais conducting interviews. A new construction manager was hired and arrived last week. Quesly, who has years of experience in construction management in Florida, has already proved to be a knowledgeable and motivated leader.

Enjoy the photos of the first days of the CSEB workshop!

MASS Immersion at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital

2011-07-13T07:43:00.000-07:00

Last week, MASS wrapped up the first phase of our work with the Cerebral Palsy team at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital (CCHMC-CP). Our presentation to the board was well received and the next several weeks look to be busy as we prepare a proposal for integrating the various programs that play a part in diagnosing and treating cerebral palsy in kids from Ohio, western Appalachia and beyond.

Through a chance meeting between Michael and John B. and his innovation team from CCHMC at a conference last fall, an idea germinated for MASS to bring their approach to bear on a first-world hospital problem. John was inspired by our commitment to building better healthcare facilities and the unique strategies we utilized in doing so. He also had a particular program (CP) that was tapped for special focus and on the lookout for innovative solutions. A partnership was formed and plans were laid. The project finally launched in May with an initial ethnography and needfinding visit where a team from MASS spent three weeks immersed with the CP clinicians and patients in Cincinnati. Cerebral Palsy covers an extraordinary breadth of conditions and symptoms, with no two patients alike. CP occurs in about 2 of every 1000 births, or about 10,000 infants per year. Major difficulties include motor, sensory and cognitive impairments, thus requiring a complicated and comprehensive treatment plan to ensure the highest level of functioning and autonomy.

We were energized by some of the challenges we saw and the potential for the MASS approach to take CCHMC-CP from being a very good program to a truly excellent program. As an example of one of the problems we are tackling, consider the twice-weekly CP clinic: Patients come in for a 2-3 hour session and during this time see a veritable army of physicians including a pediatric rehab resident, nutritionist, physical therapist, occupational therapist, social worker, and various nurses in addition to the pediatrician. Depending on the patient, they might then see a gastroenterologist or orthopedic surgeon for further diagnosis and treatment. The question of how to coordinate the flow of these specialists during the clinic, prioritizing efficiency while ensuring adequate time for all to collaborate on a treatment plan and share information is huge. Currently, 4-5 patients are seen in a 4-hour clinic session. However, they hope to grow from 250 patients to 2000 patients over the next few years. How do we create a ten-fold increase in capacity while at the same time improving the quality of care? How can we facilitate the transformation of the formerly independent CP cowboys into a perfectly integrated CP pit crew (as Atul Gawande of the New Yorker described physician teams in his address to this year’s graduating class at the Harvard Medical School)? The solutions have spatial implications as well as logistical and organizational aspects and MASS are confident we can find an innovative way to meet these two difficult criteria.

CCHMC is one of the very best children’s hospitals in the world, reaching the top 3 of the U.S. rankings in various disciplines every single year. That MASS was asked to collaborate on taking their CP program to the next level is a validation of what we have believed since day one: that architecture is about so much more than the building. It also confirms another radical notion of MASS’s: that our work changing health outcomes with a well-built environment in Rwanda is just as relevant and valid in the developed world. Healthcare facilities in the U.S. could benefit from many of the lessons learned and interventions employed in designing and building the Butaro Hospital. With their buy-in and support, the CP and DSIOP teams with whom we are working in Cincinnati have been amazing partners in this groundbreaking adventure.

Atul Gawande

US News Hospital Rankings

MoMA PS1 “Holding Pattern” Opening

2011-06-29T10:58:00.000-07:00

Michael and I attended the opening of “Holding Pattern”, Interboro’s winning entry for this year’s MoMA PS1 Young Architects Program a couple of weeks ago. MASS was privileged to be among the five finalists this year, which included Matter Practice, IJP Corporation, and Formless Finder in addition to Interboro.

It is encouraging to see another project chosen that focused on community engagement and envisioned a way for the impact of the installation to last beyond the summer. Interboro’s concept drew upon the community’s suggestions of their needs and then incorporated this eclectic collection of objects into their proposal. For example, a ballet studio’s need for mirrors, was adapted into a fun-house style room, tree’s providing much needed shade for Warm Up party participants will then be planted for different community groups after the summer. The sheer mass of trees that people asked for was itself a recognition of what is a latent desire to the inhabitants of Long Island City.

What is exciting about “Holding Pattern” is the statement it makes in the contemporary debate over the role of social engagement in architecture. Rather than differentiate this as an “Architecture of social engagement”, somehow removed from the avant-garde, Interboro has used “Holding Pattern” to articulate that choosing between the two is unnecessary – or maybe impossible.

As we have found in our work, this debate is a false one, as it suggests that the “social” implications of architecture could somehow be separated from Architecture itself. Is there such a thing as “socially unengaged” architecture? Interboro’s “Holding Pattern” suggests there is not, and it is encouraging to see MoMA has chosen to highlight this by selecting this project as this year’s winning entry.

Congratulations to Tobias, Daniel, and Georgeen and the rest of the Interboro team.

Alan Ricks
Founding Partner and Creative Director

The Poverty of Starchitecture

2011-04-19T08:18:00.000-07:00

by Michael Murphy

On March 25th, Zaha Hadid Architects made a quarter of its staff redundant, laying off more than 90 employees because of “unforeseen events in North Africa.” The reason was the democratic uprising in the Middle East, and specifically Libya, where Hadid’s new conference center outside of Tripoli had been “put on hold” while the beleaguered dictatorship’s post-meltdown kleptocracy returned its financial priorities to maintaining its grip on power.

But was this really a shift in Libya’s priorities, or rather the lifting of a veil that hid the various tools Qaddafi has employed to maintain such power for 41 years? One tool has clearly been the use of capital “A” architecture to project an image of cultural development.

Following the restoration of trade relations between the U.S. and Libya in 2006, Qaddafi has been busy leveraging his country’s emerging markets for direct, personal gain. He placed pressure on global oil companies to pay more than a billion dollars in fines emanating from the downing of Pan AM Flight 103 and other state-supported acts of terrorism. He regularly imposes — and pockets — fees from corporations seeking to gain access to these markets.

Meanwhile, Qaddafi has invested in branding to create the image of a “developed” country safe for investment. Green technology projects, as well as massive cultural centers for the “new Libya,” reflect a global trend to hire internationally recognized architects to transmit messages of progress through their works, effectively acting as cultural ambassadors.

Zaha Hadid’s architectural language is famously extravagant. When the discussion is complimentary, the word “iconic” is almost certain to pop up. Critics are more likely to describe her as excessive.

But the important question is not whether Hadid’s work looks like a squid or an octopus (as the city council of Elk Grove, California, recently debated about her new masterplan for that locale). It is whom architects are really serving — a community of residents, visitors and workers, or a community of investors — and why dictator states are the ones sponsoring so many of these projects?

Is the demand for architectural service so limited that we follow the money no matter whom it comes from? What role do architects have in changing this quid pro quo? In laying off a quarter of her staff after losing the Libyan project, Hadid seems to be saying, “Not much.” As an image-maker, she is also signaling, “Who cares?” A recent ruling by the Royal Institute of British Architects requiring all firms to pay their interns starting July 1 underscores a long history of heedlessness and apathy in the U.K. where Hadid’s office is. If architects must rely on dictators and free interns to stay afloat, they are practicing a failed business model.

The projects that get graced by capital “A” architects are intertwined with the capital required to build them. What is purchased is the commodity of cultural acumen, and not every client who can afford it has achieved his wealth through altruistic means. Capital “A” architecture should refer not to the avant garde — as it has — but to the financial status required to purchase it. What we as designers have been hoodwinked to believe is that the artistry of architecture is a universal humanist asset. What Hadid in Libya reveals is that it can just as simply be a tool.

A version of this article can also be seen on the Design Observer website at: http://changeobserver.designobserver.com/feature/the-poverty-of-starchitecture/26358/

CONSTRUCTING DIGNITY: THE BUTARO HOSPITAL OPENS

2011-01-28T14:56:00.000-08:00

On January 24th, the official opening of the Butaro Hospital, in northern Rwanda took place. It was a pristine, cloudless day, with the president of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, and our friend and mentor Dr. Paul Farmer of Partners In Health there to officiate and hand over the hospital to the Rwandan Ministry of Health.

In the Summer of 2007 when Paul Farmer asked me - then a young architecture student - to move to that hilltop and accompany his infrastructure chief on the design and construction of a new hospital, my immediate realization was that 'Architecture' as we know it was not what this district required.

The site chosen was a military camp, nestled on a steep hillside and perched high above the valleys of Butaro, which eyes the final peeks of Rwanda before fading into Uganda. Transferring the military to the medical speaks to more than the confidence of a war ravaged country to demilitarize, it showcases the priorities of a government committed to deploying the symbolic resonances needed to serve its people better.

Like the hillside, the facility was a symbolic capstone to the infrastructure that the district demanded. An infrastructure not simply of roads, water and electricity, but of the laborers, economic opportunities, educational programs, and material markets required to make this hospital built completely of and by the district of Burera.

The priorities however, were greater than simply drafting a set of plans to hand off to a local contractor. It was the construction of dignity that was required to accompany this new Butaro hospital, and as Dr. Paul Farmer accurately mentioned in his speech on Monday, this was why on this hilltop that MASS Design Group was formed.

The story of the hospital is not simply about architecture or design, it is about the iron-clad will of a country committed to emergence, healing and rebuilding. When PIH started working in this district, it had one doctor serving 350,000 people. As PIH Country Director Peter Drobac said, “Succeeding there would mean the possibility that success was possible anywhere”.

A NEW MODEL OF PRACTICE

We realized that what was required was more of a holistic model of architecture. One that could accommodate the design of an appropriate, state of the art hospital while also fully choreographing the process of construction to employ and instill dignity in a district depleted of the most fundamental of resources: hope.

This project then, is the story of a team of masons who were trained to make a stonewall unseen anywhere in the country. Carpenters that built every door and every window using local wood with local craft. 3,500 Burera residents who were employed to excavate the grounds, and construct this facility during one of three shifts, orchestrated each and every day. It is also the story of the reverberant impacts that this facility will have on the community for years.

A REGIONAL IMPACT

As I drove into Butaro on Sunday afternoon, Sierra Bainbridge, our country director pointed out the electrical wires stringing from the new poles that lead into every shop on Main Street, Butaro. This means that the hydroelectric damn down the road is finally finished and that the region's first electrical power is soon to soon follow.

After Kagame officiated the hospital, he drove to a rally in the town of Kirambo to tell a crowd of ten thousand that this hospital will not only be about healthcare delivery but infrastructure improvement. He promised to personally deliver a new project that will turn the road from red to black, i.e. from dirt to paved. This infrastructural revolution will bring commerce, economy, real estate, and wealth to the numerous towns along the climb to the new facility in Butaro.

I can easily say, it was the most powerful day of my life. One of those rare moments where time pauses, the paradigm shifts, and a different future is laid bare in front of us to imagine as possible.

What was a remote, unknown village in Rwanda will now be a regional center of excellence, not simply for Burera District, but as the Minister of Health intimated on his tour of the grounds, for the entire East African Region.

This is just the beginning. The plans, the partnerships, the execution succeeded. MASS Design Group grew from a single idea and one employee, to a current team of fifteen architects (seven in Rwanda, eights in Boston) working to prove that architecture is once again relevant. Now that the Butaro Hospital is finished, the goal is to replicate this model across multiple sites and for a spectrum of clients. Working 25,000 pro-bono hours on the Butaro Hospital was only the beginning of this amazing team's commitment to proving that better design can reduce poverty and embed dignity into communities.

INDEBTED

I want to send a special thanks to our Rwandan team of Sierra, Garret, Branden, Commode, Ebbe, Andrew, and Sarah for making this a reality, and to our founding team for envisioning a greater purpose for architecture. Alan, Alda, Marika, Ryan, David, Maura thank you.

The countless people who have given their time and guidance on this project deserve recognition. The most sincere thanks for Bruce Nizeye, Felix, Jean D’amore, Jean Luc, Adriane and the many builders who led the construction and guided us through this transformation.

To the PIH Team of Ted Constan, Peter Drobac, Ophelia Dahl, Perry Doherty, Victor, Odile, Naomi, Amanda, Melissa, Kate Thorson, Jim Kim, our friend Dr. Paul Farmer and the countless others, our deepest gratitude for recognizing that any discipline can contribute to the fight against injustice.

Mostly however, to all of our friends, supporters, and family, you have provided us the support that allowed us to envision a Model of Architecture that truly Serves Society.

With the deepest gratitude,

Michael

Michael Murphy
Executive Director
MASS Design Group

Click on the following links:
To see a slideshow of the Butaro Hospital.
To read about the opening in the Rwandan New Times.
To read about the opening in the South African Times.
To see the new article about MASS in Metropolis Magazine.
To learn more about MASS.

Framing Social Engagement in Architecture

2010-11-11T07:44:00.000-08:00

MASS Presenting at WAF in Barcelona

The World Architecture Festival, just three years old, is now an important stage for the architectural community.

Last year’s grand prize of “Building of the Year” went to Peter Rich of South Africa, for his Mapungubwe Interpretation Center, a project that the jury agreed heralded a new era in architecture, architectural form, and recognition for the work emerging unique to the African continent. In many ways it has. Over the last year, work from the continent has emerged in more publications as part of a larger discourse and not an essentialized subset. Studios are popping up everywhere, and the MoMA show, Small Scale Big Change, Architecture of Social Engagement which opened in October shows two projects, Frances Kere and Noero Wolff, whose architecture exemplifies what curator Andres Lepik frames as “pioneering site-specific ecological and socially sustainable practices”.

Jo Noero presented at the World Architecture Festival as well, showing his award-winning project that was featured in MoMA, - The Red Location Museum of Struggle. His comments outlined the local material innovation, the use of 50% local unskilled labor, and the aims of the project to activate property value, housing, regional and localized development through the creation of a vibrant cultural center and heritage site. His discussions were about form, process, cultural value, and social impact and yet, with a seemingly contradictory message from Lepik’s curatorial aim Jo’s final comments disregarded the terms ‘humanity’ or ‘socially engaged’ as a reduction to architectural value. “The work we do is quite simple”, he continued. ‘This is what architecture is, and should do to be architecture”. Any effort to frame or complicate a project as ‘socially engaged’, he implied, was suggesting architecture could be anything but. An idealist and activist approach, Noero is looking towards the future where architecture is not determined by the subset of which it is framed.

But framed it is and framed it needs to be. Otherwise, why would architects be in such an identity crisis? When MoMA and others are pushing an agenda of social engagement to highlight a critique of practice, it is not to denigrate work but to suggest an imbalanced perception of architectural value, instead memorializing architects instead of the people and places that Noero might say, is a ‘requirement’ for architecture to emerge at all.

This identity crisis of architecture is not lost to the WAF either. Where last year it shot to fame an architect whose whole project was the locally found, locally built, formally unique work of South Africa; this year, Zaha Hadid’s MAXXI was awarded the grand prize, much to the irritation of many in the audience. Zaha fatigue was evident in the room - if not the globe - and while few critiqued the work formally, my general impression was that this fatigue is not simply the diva, self memorializing, starkitecture that was once again being awarded, but something deeper abrew. Remembering what Jo Noero was saying, seemed to hint at what that could be - that there is something visibly vacant from this work. An emptiness is tangible from this approach to architecture that may not have been evident without the committed few over the past decade reinforcing the need for social change to emerge again through the built environment. Activists, like Bryan Bell, John Cary, Public Architecture, Diana Murphy, to name a few, that have pushed an agenda of social engagement to support those like Jo Noero and over and over referred to this work as Architecture all along. The irony of course is that in canonizing this at MoMA this month, its unintended consequence could be the very opposite this attempt at leveling, and instead a classic reproduction of the paradigm of the genius auteur - what Katie Swenson from the Rose Architectural Fellowship refers to as the ego of form, not the function of living.

MIchael P. Murphy / MASS Design Group

MASS Wins Urban SOS Competition at WAF in Barcelona

2010-11-08T08:19:00.000-08:00

We are pleased and honored to announce that the MASS Team of Michael Murphy, Caroline Shannon, Joseph Wilfong, and Robin Bankert won the AECOM Urban SOS competition for their plan for Port Au Prince at the World Architecture Festival in Barcelona, Spain this weekend.

MASS' project was chosen among four other finalists, and over 200 initial submissions from 45 countries around the world. The assignment was to take one of seven cities currently undergoing transformations and to propose a model of rehabilitation. Our group from MASS tackled the issue of urban renewal in Haiti's post earthquake Port Au Prince, with a project entitled "Campus Catalyst". The proposed project looked to education in skilled trades, such as carpentry and agronomy, as a main solution to the social issues surrounding community and infrastructure development. The WAF panel commended this model for being one that could be replicated in other areas of conflict and disaster. More coverage on the competition and our "Campus Catalyst" model can be found at: http://www.worldarchitecturefestival.com/news-detail.cfm?newsId=174

African in Motion Reception

2010-10-19T07:17:00.000-07:00

The Committee on African Studies and The Dubois Institute are sponsoring The Africa In Motion reception at The Laboratory at Harvard this Thursday. The Lab at Harvard is a forum for innovation and brainstorming within the arts and sciences at Harvard University. This Thursday the exhibition will highlight the various African initiatives that were thought up by members of the Harvard community.

MASS Design Group has been selected to showcase its work at the Burundi Hospital as an example of the kind of innovation and interdisciplinary work that can be done on the continent. Stop by the Lab Thursday evening to see our designs or the following day for a symposium on the wide variety of ideas being undertaken in the field.

http://thelaboratory.harvard.edu/event/africainmotion/

Fast Company Names MASS Group Emerging Voice in 2010 Master of Design Issue

2010-09-22T15:08:00.000-07:00

We are humbled to be considered one of the emerging voices in the new Fast Company 2010 Masters of Design Issue. Check out the full issue here (http://www.fastcompany.com/design/2010). While the report is flattering, it is missing the acknowledgment of all the people that make MASS Design Group work. None of the Butaro Hospital could be completed without the work of Alan, Sierra, Ryan, Marika, Garret, Branden, Ebbe, Commode, Nicholas, Alda, David, Cody, Karen, Maura, Bruce Nizeye, Peter Drobac, Michael Rich, or our mentor Paul Farmer.

Needless to say, the movement is generating some interest. The hospital is nearly finished, pouring its finishing floors this week and starting on the landscaping and finishing. Check back for the updated images next week when Alan returns from his ten country african tour!

Thanks Fast Company and thank to the people at PIH and MASS

Michael

URBAN SOS: Campus Catalyst

2010-08-10T06:22:00.000-07:00

The Harvard Graduate School of Design interns and students in the office this summer submitted a proposal for AECOM's Urban SOS competition a few weeks ago. The proposal, a distributed vocational school embedded in an existing settlement, aims to use precise replicable and scalable strategies to improve education, increase jobs and rebuild Port-au-Prince.

Building Where the Need Is

2010-07-28T09:20:00.000-07:00

The Spring 2010 issue of the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA) magazine is now out. With a focus on Africa, the issue includes articles by a few of our fellow Harvard Graduate School of Design alumns and a piece by Michael on working with Partners In Health to design and construct the Butaro Hospital in Rwanda.

BUTARO: details

2010-07-19T15:20:00.000-07:00

Hospital way-finding signage by Vignelli Associates.

A light well in the lower level ambulatory clinic

Looking through the latest site photos from the Butaro Hospital, we are excited to see how the details and finishes are shaping up... The painted steel plate signage (designed with Vignelli Associates... thanks Beatriz and Yoshi!) will withstand the elements and looks great on the exterior stone walls. And the light well not only provides natural ventilation to the ambulatory clinic but also showcases the skills of the local masons that constructed the stone walls.

PROJECT UPDATE: BUTARO

2010-07-19T14:21:00.000-07:00

The latest site photos from the Butaro Hospital are in (thanks, Marika!) and things are looking on track for the hospital's opening later this summer.

A winter 2007 design charrette for the hospital

Architecture = Humanitarian design

2010-07-09T09:37:00.000-07:00

Bruce Nussbaum is right to point out the danger of 'humanitarian' design in his recent Fast Company Design post, and we thank him for pushing the dialogue, but he largely misses the point. His critique of humanitarian design is really a critique of aid. And that critique, recently churned through by Dambisa Moyo's Dead Aid, is of the neo-imperial approach to humanitarian work and addresses the exhaustion about development and aid in general. Moyo's critique, like the crowd at Pilloton's talk, is that aid has largely failed to 'listen' to the needs of the local. This is William Easterly's critique of Jeff Sachs as well, which argues for the same solution: More on the ground, localized, culturally specific problem solving. We agree that this is imperative, but how can architecture offer a new solution to this common critique?

Cameron Sinclair's response is spot on. First he rejects the idea that humanitarian architecture and design is isolated to a few specific projects that fail to meet the mark, and second he critiques the talkers from the doers. It's easy, he seems to say, as writers and reporters to reject something as a failed project. But isn't it much harder to show how something is working well to create social impact than it is to reject it?

As much as anyone, Sinclair and Stohr are responsible for our current trend in design, rethinking the end-user, and advocating for a movement to change the hegemony of architecture. But it is not simply a trend any more, it is the zeitgeist in architecture. And if it is the zeitgeist, it takes hold in thousands ways, in thousands of places, all over the world and all at once. So what we need, instead of failed examples, are principles to help us articulate what succeeds in order to mold this movement into projects that empower.

We can begin with a few principles:

1. Industrial Design and Architectural Design are not the same thing.

Nussbaum's article commits the first sin in my opinion. Which is to interchange industrial design for architectural design. Industrial Design has the luxury to address one problem in one context. When it fails, it often can be traced to specific failings in the delivery system or that it didn't actually address the root problem. For architecture to be successful, it must weave together hundreds of thousands of problems, in difficult climates, with limited expertise. It requires local buy in AND top-down policy that is successful. And it costs exponentially more than what industrial design costs. This makes the stakes higher by far, and when it fails, it devastates. For us to rate architectural success, we must see the holistic picture, the complete impact, and to anticipate the years it will take to fully quantify the impact of a successful built environment. When industrial design fails, it simply grumbles away.

2. 'Humanitarian Architecture' IS Architecture

From this point forward, we must stop referring to architecture and humanitarian architecture as two different things. Principles of social value have always been a part of architecture and space-making, it just has been lying dormant under the weight of designers who’ve believed in artistry over impact, ego over articulation. With the new zeitgeist, architecture reclaims its dormant responsibilities to care for and consider the user, the underserved, and the appropriate.

3. Failure, success, and what's in between.

If good architecture is a matrix of hundreds of thousands of decisions, some projects will work well and some will miss the mark. Great buildings to date have been thought to hit all of the marks in terms of form, program, and space. But with architecture that considers its humanitarian impact, the metrics are much more complex and much more difficult to quantify. Bryan Bell at SEED has pushed the agenda to quantify social impact alongside environmental and economic solutions. We are indebted to him for leading this charge and being an architect of the zeitgeist.

But it makes me think that what is actually being asked here is Nussbaum's and Moyo's and Easterly's similar question: How can development and aid have a more quantifiable positive impact? Through our work with Partners in Health on the design and construction of the Butaro Hospital in Rwanda we have found that architecture provides a unique way in. We have learned from our Rwandan collaborators that capital “A" architecture is better understood as the physical manifestation of successful top down policies AND community-based design. Without both in place, you have buildings. These buildings may have some success and some failure, but they are not Architecture. With more advocates and practitioners of the zeitgeist seeking this new definition of capital “A” architecture, we will have an increasingly better understanding of policies, materials, and design innovations that are successful. We will understand what work results in the development of real solutions and where re-calibration is required, rather than dismissing its potential out of hand.

Michael Murphy

MASS Design Group, Executive Director

BUTARO BENCH

2010-07-08T13:38:00.000-07:00

The Butaro Hospital benches, along with the other furniture designs for the facility, are in production at the local workshop and will be in place in time for the Hospital's opening later this month.