To address the growing problem and relieve this pressure on the country’s housing market, Marc Thorpe Design, Stage Six and Échale International are developing sustainable and ecologically responsible houses for middle to lower-income families.
The group recently completed the first house in their planned series called the Kampala House, and it was constructed using Échale International’s EcoBlock, which is essentially a brick made of compressed earth.
According to Echale International, the EcoBlock is produced with 90 per cent local soil and a 10 per cent mixture of cement, lime, sand and water, making it ecologically-sustainable as well as a thermal and acoustic insulator that produces 30 per cent less carbondioxide (CO2).
“We will initially produce 10 houses of the same size just outside of Kampala, but hope to expand the project in the region once this first stage is complete,” Thorpe added.
The Kampala house features three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a living and dining area and a kitchen. A large terrace wraps the front and side of the house, perfect for leisure activities, and connected to the kitchen exterior is a traditional Ugandan wood burning stove for outdoor cooking.
The house is fitted with a large corrugated steel and wood roof, designed to support solar panels and to harvest rainwater, which is stored in an adjacent water tower. The concept of the water tower for each home is to provide a community network of water supply so that the community will be able to access it and share it in the event of a drought.
“We always begin [the design process] with understanding the social, economic and environmental dynamics of a site and we are currently working with a local developer and architect to best understand the programmatic requirements for the area around Kampala,” Thorpe said.
The goal of the house is to create an environmentally-responsible home that responds to its surrounding context and environment, while providing a socio-economic opportunity to homeownership and community stewardship. The first houses of Echale International will be constructed in Uganda in the second quarter of 2022.
“We believe in an architecture of responsibility,” says Marc.
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