Vernacular African Architecture • Wide range of ecosystems and climates, from tropical rain forest to savannah, from coast to desert.
• Type of architecture and materials used respond to what is available and to the needs of the environment.
• Although contemporary vernacular structures con=nue to be built and inhabited, Africa is rapidly modernizing.
Nigeria
Lagos: largest city in Nigeria
• Mali • Rwanda • Congo • South Africa
Mali • Dogon architecture • Timbuktu • Mosque of Djenne
Mud Bricks
Dogon region: Bandiagara
Dogon town
Tellem (Pygmy) town
Toguna: community men’s house: village council
Timbuktu
Great Mosque of Djenne
• Made of “banco” or adobe (mud brick); largest mud brick building in the world.
Interior views
Rwanda: King’s house
“Living fence” typical of Rwanda
Tradi=onal mee=ng house
Congolese vernacular architecture:
South Africa: Ndebele people
Very brief history
• Ndebele people split from Zulu in 1600s. Different fac=ons went north (now Zimbabwe) and south (South Africa); laZer retained language and culture
• Boers (white farmers) encroached on their land and demanded all their goods; Ndebele lost war in 1883.
• Ndebele people were essen=ally enslaved on their own land, taken over by Boers.
• As white-‐controlled South Africa restricted Africans to “homelands” (counterpart to “reserva=ons” in the US), some Ndebele ended up together on ancestral land.
• During their occupa=on, Ndebele began pain=ng dis=nc=ve abstract paZerns on their houses.
• Ini=ally painted mud with fingers. • Later earth-‐toned colors: limestone whitewas covered with natural ochres and black, applied with
s=cks with Feathers aZached.
• House pain=ng an act of resistance, a form of secret communica=on among the Ndebele.
• Tradi=on con=nues to the present, and cons=tutes some of the best known vernacular architecture in Africa.
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