Burkinabe architect Diébédo Francis Kéré's studio has built a university in Burkina Faso, western Africa, which has walls made with locally sourced clay and screens of eucalyptus wood.
The facility, named the Burkina Institute of Technology, forms part of Lycée Schorge Secondary School campus in Koudougou that was also designed by Kéré Architecture.
It was built to expand the campus, owned by the Stern Stewart Institute, and offer high school graduates an opportunity to continue their education.
Above: Kéré Architecture has completed the Burkina Institute of Technology. Top: it is located on a flood plain in Koudougou
The 2,100-square-metre building is composed of a series of repeated modules that contain classrooms, lecture halls and auxiliary spaces. The modules are placed in a staggered formation to facilitate airflow in and around the building. Those that contain the classrooms are arranged around a rectangular courtyard at their centre.
Eucalyptus wood wraps the exterior walls
Each module of the Burkina Institute of Technology is made with local clay that has been combined with concrete and then poured and cast in-situ into large formworks.
The formworks are the size of one whole classroom and were designed to be disassembled and rebuilt to cast each module.
The main structure is made from clay combined with concrete
This building technique is informed by the studio's construction of a primary school in Gando, for which it has used the same method. It is a qui...