Aiming to re-establish the Northern Community outside the tradition settlement of Bungamati in the Kathmandu valley, Nepal. The project looks at rebuilding ancestral homes post the 2015 earthquake whilst re-appropriating free space in conjunction with an existing institution

 

Site Explanation

Situated on the periphery of Bungamati, on the road to Kokana, lies a semi-rural landscape containing a variety of building types accommodating a mixture of lifestyles and cultural dynamics. The site encompasses a high ridge road fringed by a scattering of wealthy residential concrete framed houses. Adjacent to the lower pedestrian road there are wood carpentry workshops, a guesthouse, a café, and corner shop. Between these surviving buildings lie many destroyed brick houses most of whose inhabitants now live in rooms just 10ft X 10ft within donated or self-made shelters. The socio-economic structure of the area is based on subsistence farming producing a configuration of terraces, which forms a remarkable landscape covering the area between the ridge and the pedestrian road.

 

The proposal

The diversity of the site gives a uniquely dynamic quality and any proposal for the site must begin with maintaining this atmosphere whilst improving the quality of life, giving prime importance to the urgent need for sanitation. My initial intention is based on the relocation of families from temporary shelters back into repaired or rebuilt ancestral homes, which will be appropriately designed to respect the heritage of each house and incorporate earthquake resistant technologies. Following this, the newly cleared land can be re-appropriated to form a new relationship with the existing guesthouse, as a focus for tourism, and the community of rice farmers living on the site.