INCLUSIVE BUSINESS

Inclusive Business Made in Italy
In poor contexts the ability of the architect is that of
challenging the scarcity of resources: an example is the
work of Kerè architects iv , firm founded in Berlin in 2005
“seeking to create economic and ecological building
solutions for local situations in a global context”.
Most of their projects are located in Burkina Faso,
where “the main focus of his work is the usage and development
of local materials and techniques, the adaptation
of new technology in a simple way and the potential
of the local community”. In this case the use of the local
clay as main material for all the buildings helped their
performance in terms of insulation and ventilation.
The Chilean architect Alejandro Aravena v in 2000
founded ELEMENTAL, a for profit company with social
interest. “When Elemental began in Harvard University
in 2000, social housing was associated with a lack of
economic and professional resources that had generated
a lack of options for poor families”. The project
Quinta Monroy “consisted in re-establishing 93 families
on the site where they had been squatting for the last 30
years with a budget of just US$7,500 per family”. The
auto-construction was seen as the only way to proceed:
users obtained a dwelling whose value accrued due to
their late modifications. Doing so, the architectural intervention
was turned into a social investment instead of a
social expenditure.
i. Favela Barrio (slum to neighborhood) is a pioneering project in slum-upgrading
in Rio de Janeiro. It has contributed to the mindset of urban planning as a participatory
process. http://theinformalcity.blogspot.co.uk/2011/06/favela-bairro.html
ii. From the MIT website http://web.mit.edu/urbanupgrading/upgrading/case-examples/ce-BL-fav.html
iii. Construction of the youth centre is a result of cooperation between Komitu
Architects, a group of young Finnish architects and two Cambodian NGOs:
Cambodian Volunteers for Society (CVS) and Khmer Kampuchea Krom Human
Rights and Development Organisation (KKKHRDA) who work with the youth from
Phnom Penh’s poor communities offering those possibilities for education, employment
and societal participation. http://en.presstletter.com/2014/05/kouk-khleang-youth-center-komitu-architects/
iv. For more information visit the architect’s official website http://www.kere-architecture.com/
v. For more information visit the architect’s official website http://alejandroaravena.
com/obras/vivienda-housing/elemental/
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