Capturing Space Community of Parts
The architecture of Ubuntu Centre employs a simple yet deliberate method of capturing space, born from the existing footpaths across the site. The forms of the buildings are lifted vertically from and woven through these pathways, imparting a sense of the collective ownership by enlisting the public space of the site. The resulting volumes embrace these spaces of exchange, providing a place to congregate for the people of Zwide. Once the organizing principle of the pathways were traced on the site, the fashioning of space enclosure was achieved by setting out an unfolded pattern of enclosing surfaces. The folded concrete planes are partially self supporting, and with the lateral buttressing of the adjacent form, the ensemble of distributed form attains a collective structural integrity. This folded plate system of self-supporting walls and roofs liberates the remaining two exterior surfaces to transmit light and ventilation, free from structural responsibility. The resulting sense of support and interdependence of the parts helps to transmit an early objective we had: one in which the building itself is a community of parts acting in support of one another, transmitting the essence of the Ubuntu philosophy.
above constructing the in situ concrete walls
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