Bangladesh can be an example for other countries if people from all disciplines, not just the architects, can put in their best efforts for the country, says a young architect.
“We got the recognition relatively in a very early stage. It proves that those in the architecture discipline are demonstrating world class examples,” architect Saad Ben Mostafa told UNB.
Mostafa is one of the three young architects whose project titled “Community Spaces in Rohingya Refugee Response, Cox’s Bazar” won the prestigious 2022 Aga Khan Award for Architecture (AKAA).
Six winners, who will share the USD 1 million award, one of the biggest in architecture, show promise for communities, innovation and care for the environment.
Mostafa along with his two teammates – architects Khwaja Fatmi and Rizvi Hassan – will receive the award with other winners on Monday.
The graduate from the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) laid emphasis on focusing on work while understanding people’s needs and roots, not just replicating foreign designs.
“I would say, we are going to receive the award on behalf of all. I see it as a big recognition for Bangladesh,” architect Fatmi told UNB.
Architect Hassan said they wanted to see whether they can work based on local elements – taking materials and creating a beautiful, sustainable and an advanced design.
In future, he said, they want to work in rural areas. “We want to engage people from the villages in our work. We want to see them join hands with us. We will work together.”
The three architects said the latest achievement is part of a long journey and they want to work keeping people and the country’s needs in focus.
Recalling the challenges of working in a crowded Rohingya camp, Mostafa said it was difficult but they tried to create something extraordinary.
“Through our work, we explored how such a structure’s longevity can be extended with sustainability,” said architect Hassan.
Architect Fatmi said this was the best time for them to focus on the skills, creativity and wisdom of the local community to reflect on the spaces and the design. “We wanted to give voices to their skills and expertise.”
Architect Mostafa said they decided to involve all the craftsmen and people in the community as they tried to create a dignified space, a space that represents their identity with the touch of their hands.
Architect Hassan said they tried to develop and propose a new solution in this tropical monsoon climate.
Rather than separate projects, the six sustainably built structures in the world’s largest refugee camps – housing Rohingyas fleeing genocide in Myanmar – are a collection of practice exercises. Each created scope for the next according to need.
Much of the design was created collaboratively in the field. A women-friendly space, very low to withstand cyclones, features a complex roof truss built by Rohingya bamboo craftsmen without drawings or models.
A safe space offering practical support to women and girls employed local materials and an exterior scheme that avoids disturbance caused to visiting elephants by the blues and pinks of standard camp structures.
A facility for women to create and showcase their handmade products is built of bamboo and thatch.
One community support centre uses colourful mattresses as roof insulation; another mixes natural materials with industrial ones; another is built around existing betel nut trees, resisting the tendency to deforestation.
Another project from Bangladesh titled “Urban River Spaces, Jhenaidah” is also among the six winners.
Through consistent community participation and appropriation, extensive involvement of women and marginalised groups, and a local workforce, the seemingly simple undertaking of cleaning up the access to the Nabaganga river in Jhenaidah led to a thoughtful and minimal landscaping project with local materials and construction techniques, thus transforming a derelict informal dump site into an attractive and accessible multifunctional space that is valued by Jhenaidah’s diverse communities.
As such, the project managed to reverse the ecological degradation and health hazards of the river and its banks, and induce effective ecological improvement of the river, in one of the most riverine countries on earth.
The Aga Khan Award for Architecture recognises examples of architectural excellence in the fields of contemporary design, social housing, community improvement and development, historic preservation, reuse and area conservation, as well as landscape design and improvement of the environment.
