BLANTYRE AND MULANJE MALAWI
COLLABORATION WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS HONORS COLLEGE AND PEACEWORK After being nominated to study abroad, I received funding from Peacework and the University of Arkansas Honor’s College to go to Malawi, Africa to use my academic experiences and skills in humanitarian development. Not knowing what projects I might be doing until arriving on site, I set off for Blantyre, Malawi in June of 2015. My host, Chris Walker, quite the entrepreneur and visionary, immediately tasked me with several projects. After a couple weeks of brainstorming on these projects, I narrowed my focus to two, both of which are featured in this presentation. In my first five weeks, I finished the final design for a sustainable restaurant kitchen at Chris’ business Pa Nthunzi “the sustainability center”. The kitchen was to supplement the finances to continue his business in permaculture training and landscaping. Chris sent me off to the rural area of Mulanje for my last five weeks to prepare a design for a demonstration permaculture garden that would be used as a community center to host training sessions on permaculture and spike the interest of rural communities in the benefits of permaculture design. Aiming to recreate nature’s patterns and form a collection of ecological cycles, permaculture strategies will help the community use resources more efficiently and boost their food supply.
CARLY BARTOW - FAY JONES SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE + DESIGN SUMMER 2015 - DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE
PROJECT 1 - SUSTAINABLE RESTAURANT KITCHEN KITCHEN INTRODUCTION AND PLANNING PHASE
SUSTAINABLE STRATEGIES INCORPORATED IN THE DESIGN 1. Passive air flow strategies: Centralized clerestory window ventilation, passive air cooling tower (P.A.C.T.) and PVC pipe airways at the base along the eastern edge of the space and a pocket herb wall with recessed windows along the western side 2. Arrangement of components in the plan for efficient use of human energy 3. Excess heat reduction strategies: Arrangement of heat producing technology in the plan to allow for immediate release of excess heat into the exterior and arrangement of food cooling units to retain the greatest amount of energy possible
Section drawing of restaurant kitchen
The sustainable restaurant kitchen project began with obtaining a list of kitchen requirements from Chris Walker, and taking measurements of the site. The program was to include not only a kitchen space, but also an administrative space for the kitchen manager and a number of security measures against theft. After sketching a site plan, I began researching precedents for kitchens, both online and by visiting five different restaurant kitchens in the city. I learned about the different sort of appliances used and the difficulties other restaurants experienced in their kitchens. In the meantime, I began sketching out iterations of the plan and researching different sustainable technologies that I could incorporate in the design. I researched wind patterns, sunlight and humidity in Malawi to help choose the best strategies. At the end of five weeks, I presented Chris with a final plan that satisfied his requirements.
Diagramatic sketch of restaurant kitchen plan
5. Water collection and reuse strategies: Iron corrugated roofing with PVC gutters and water tank for rain water collection, and use of a water tank atop the P.A.C.T. for gravity-propelled water transport to the gardens and the P.A.C.T. water pads as an evaporative cooling strategy
PURPOSES OF KITCHEN An intention behind the kitchen is to further diversify the function of Pa Nthunzi as a multiuse facility. In combination with restaurant dining, the kitchen will supplement the business income for further landscaping projects and attract more people to the facility, creating greater exposure to the principles of permaculture. The kitchen will better equip the Pa Nthunzi to host and serve food at social events, and could be used as an educative tool in Chris’ permaculture training classes. Incorporated within the design are numerous techniques to make the kitchen sustainable. For example, one of the connections between building operations and building features from kitchen to other operations on site includes the reuse of ‘Humanure’ (human poop) from the nearby future public restroom as a fuel source for the future on-site which will, in turn, be used in combination with solar panels for the cooking and lighting of the kitchen.
4. Passive indirect lighting strategies: A light tube, colored wineglass wall lighting, recessed pocket windows, and a clerestory
6. Use of local environmentally-friendly construction materials: brick, stone and concrete for the walls, concrete and recycle glass for the work surfaces, recycled wine glass bottles for lighting and aesthetics
Brainstorming for restaurant kitchen
7. Indoor connections to the outdoor permaculture gardens and aesthetics that give recognition to the beauty of natural landforms: wine glass wall that artistically recreates the local mountain-scape, and a pocket herb wall that creates easy access to herbs from both the kitchen and gardens Elevation design for restaurant kitchen
BUILDING PHASE AND CHALLENGES
ON-SITE OF FUTURE KITCHEN The footprint of the design was largely predetermined because it is situated within the main complex of Pa Nthunzi. The reuse of some of the current structural framework, such as some of the preexisting brick and stone walls, along with the clerestory roof, created both opportunities and challenging constraints. One advantage included the ability to save on construction costs by reusing the materials. One challenge to working with the preexisting structure was to ensure adequate passive air circulation.
DAILY LIFE IN BLANTYRE, MALAWI
Construction of the kitchen Site context for the kitchen
The planning and design phases are just the beginning. While I spent some time gathering average cost of kitchen appliances in Blantyre, completing an estimated budget proved to be a challenge. Construction, funding and sourcing of materials were, at best, barely touched upon before I had to return to the United States. Currently, the sustainable restaurant kitchen is under construction. In Malawi, getting tools can be much more difficult due to current systems of trade and transportation. For example, one day I went to ten different hardware stores to find a 10 meter tape measure, and after I got the tape measure, it broke. The design has adjusted as new opportunies have emerged during the construction process, such as the sourcing of cheap concrete blocks that substitute for bricks and create less labor for the workers.
Every morning I would wake up at Kabula Lodge around 5 am to watch the sunrise. I would eat a hearty breakfast with fig jam on four pieces of toast and an egg sandwich with a glass of milk while I sent out emails during the short period I could have access to free wifi. Other students, primarly from northern Europe, would trickle in before I left to workout and get dressed. My typical week day consisted of a fifteen minute run downhill to Pa Nthunzi where I would begin work. I would make measurements or design iterations until I would go to the market with my best friend in Malawi, Clifford, who works for Chris. We would buy food at Chimusa Market daily and bring it back to Pa Nthunzi to cook and eat lunch with Florence, our mutual friend. After lunch I would work until about 5 pm and leave before it got dark around 6 pm.
BLANTYRE AND MULANJE MALAWI
COLLABORATION WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS HONORS COLLEGE AND PEACEWORK After spending five weeks in the city of Blantyre, working on projects including a sustainable restaurant kitchen, as well as dormitories and a public restroom, Chris Walker, my host, sent me off to the rural area of Mulanje, Malawi in July of 2015. Without fluency in Chichewa, the language spoken in Mulanje, and no longer with a host, I was fortunate to partner with Hiwa Namatica, a local who has a Bachelor’s in Agriculture. Hiwa had taken Chris’ permaculture training classes and obtained his certificate in Permaculture. He spends most of his time training lead farmers in Mulanje and starting his new agricultural shop in Likhubula, a subdistrict of Mulanje at the base of Mount Mulanje. Before I arrived in Malawi, Hiwa Namatica had introduced Chris to TA Nkanda, the district chief over some hundred villages. Subsequently, the TA offered Chris the use a piece of land outside her residence for the purpose of permaculture demonstration. Since Chris would be soon leaving for a permaculture conference held in London, he assigned me the task of designing the project.
CARLY BARTOW - FAY JONES SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE + DESIGN SUMMER 2015 - DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE
PROJECT 2 - DEMONSTRATION PERMACULTURE GARDEN AND COMMUNITY CENTER
SUSTAINABLE STRATEGIES INCORPORATED IN THE DESIGN
GARDENS AND COMMUNITY CENTER INTRODUCTION AND PLANNING PHASE
Gathering data from the site and community stakeholders through meetings, interviews, surveys and field work took up most of my time in Mulanje. For this project, I worked alongside a permaculture specialist, Hiwa Namatica, who translated my meetings with the community. We had the help of the community everyday- once counting up to 38 volunteers, not including the younger children. We mapped out all the medicinal, edible, and certain indigenous vegetation on the 180’ x 150’ parcel of land. A principle of permaculture is to preserve preexisting, useful plants on the site.
Site work and community collaboration
Section drawing of restaurant kitchen
Brainstorming for kitchens and gardens
NEXT STEPS
PERMACULTURE In chapter 6 of ‘Agriculture’, White Brese defines permaculture as, “a system of agricultural and social design principles centered around simulating or directly utilizing the patterns and features observed in natural ecosystems.” The first step in any permaculture garden is to map out zones. These zones range from zero to five. Zero represents the area most often occupied by people. Five represents the least managed and human-occupied area on the site. The zones establish the kind of use different areas of the land will have, as the adjacent diagram depicts. As permaculture strategies aim to recreate nature’s patterns and form a collection of cycles, mechanisms in a permaculture garden might include: the use of compost toilets and the creation of compost heaps for soil fertilization and waste recycling; swales and keyhole planting beds for self-irrigation and prevention of soil erosion from surface runoff; chicken tractors for soil fertilization, weeding and feeding chickens; guild and companion planting for growth of healthy crops for aiding our work in management and replenishing soil nutrients.
Diagrams of permaculture zoning
Although the community would like to begin building, construction on the demonstration permaculture gardens and community center has not begun due to funding constraints. Before leaving, I began to work with Africare to try to establish a cooperative effort. With the help of the community, we also began sourcing construction materials and setting up a gardens management committee. TA Nkanda agreed to run the restaurant and Chambe Secondary School agreed to send students during the semester to help care for the gardens so that the students can be educated on permaculture through them. In return, the food from the gardens would help supplement the school feeding program. After speaking to the chiefs of other villages in Mulanje, they not only supported the effort, they also indicated the desire to have more demonstration permaculture gardens.
RECREATIONAL TRIPS AND EVENTS
Medicinal and edible crops in Zone 1 at Pa Nthunzi
Chicken tractor at Foundations for Farming
Companion crops, compost toilets and compost
PUBLIC PARTICIPATION AND CHALLENGES
Without 90 degree angles and with a large site varying in elevation, I had to redo my design many times in order to ensure that the future built structures accommodated all preexisting underground water pipelines and plants that needed to be left alone and preserved. We started with a GPS in order to give coordinates of points on the site, but it proved unreliable. Mapping the site involved other challenges: stretching the 50m surveyor’s tape measure across the site with the help of children never produced exact measurements. This may have been because of the tape measure blowing in the wind or from locals stealing the wood posts we had hammered in as place markers. Having worked alongside many locals and incorporated their input into the design, Hiwa and I presented and received approval of the design from members of the community including: TA Nkanda, neighbors and volunteers, the school feeding program committee and the teachers of the secondary school down the road from TA Nkanda’s, as well as to Chris Walker and Africare, an NGO.
The Community Center and Demonstration Permaculture Garden project incorporated many of the restaurant kitchen project’s sustainable strategies, as well as: 1. Thatch roofing as a low-cost, local and environmentally-friendly material 2. Public participation strategies: community inclusion from the beginning of the design process with surveys, collaborative meetings, interviews and joint field work to the later planning phases, such as the presentation of design alternatives to community members and other stakeholders 3. Companion-crop field beds for intercrop plantings such as maize and beans 4. A vegetable nursery with keyhole irrigation in planting beds 5. Composting toilets and compost housing 6. Rocket stoves, which are easy to construct and efficiently use wood for cooking 7. A multi-purpose facility (bookshop, student workshop, restaurant kitchen, indoor and outdoor dining areas, and a seed and crop surplus shop) 8. Preservation of preexisting useful plants: mango trees, an acacia tree, a ‘tomato plant, a fig tree, amaranthas (edible plant), ‘kamota’ and ‘mafuma’ (medicinal plants), citrus trees, bluegum trees, a ‘tangonyoli’ tree, and plants on the west side that can serve as a part of the living hedge 9. Outdoor gathering space under the shade of the ‘tangonyoli’ tree with views to Mt. Mulanje to immerse students into the gardens 10. Raised chicken and duck coops, and a fish pond 12. Established permaculture zoning areas 13. Long and deep crenellation in the fish pond to create diverse microclimates for a variety of plant and animal species like tadpoles, which are useful for plant growth and pest management
Sketch of demonstration permaculture gardens and communtiy center masterplan
Apart from design and field work in Blantyre and Mulanje, I was able to explore the raw beauty of Malawi. I completed a 52 kilometer hike, not including elevation change, over three mountains in Blantyre within 13 hours. I also hiked to the highest peak of Mount Mulanje and back down to La Karumba Waterfall within 30 hours. At the invitation of my European friends, I traveled to Zomba, Lake Malawi, Majete Game Reserve and Liwonde National Park. My friend, Clifford, took me to two professional soccer games. I also visited several churches and attended two weddings. Game drive and canoe safari in Liwonde National Park
Team Malawi plays at Kamuzu Stadium
Snowden’s wedding
Field notes for site measurements
Sketches of east and south elevations for the community center
REFLECTIONS ON THE EXPERIENCE
Life in Mulanje included walking and bicycling for long stretches. During that time, I was often awed by the natural landscape and way of life as I watched the locals picking tea leaves in fields of vibrant green or listening to the overwhelming sound of the forest. Befriending Malawians and many others from around the world who offered diverse perspectives was especially enriching. Designing architecture in Africa that is actually going to be built and affect people’s lives presented many challenges that I had never faced before. I woke up every day with a sense of urgency, knowing I could make a big difference. At times, that meant I was to spend hours in my room designing, other times, I would summit mountains. One time, I put out a forest fire with my friend, Snowden, the cook at my guesthouse in Likhubula. I gained valuable experience in how to plan, gather and lead a project for a large community of a different culture and language, as well as how to design for a client and present to diverse stakeholders.