Building Together: The Kaira Looro Journey

Throughout our architectural education, we get used to arranging sheets on our own and filtering design decisions through our individual lenses. But this time was entirely different. For the Kaira Looro Architecture Competition, we entered a design process completely from scratch with a team larger than two for the first time—a group of four.

First, a bit about the competition's spirit. Kaira Looro is a fantastic platform aimed at designing humanitarian, sustainable, and locally constructible structures for rural communities in Senegal, Africa. This year's brief called for a Community Center that would bring community members together—a space that is both sheltered and breathable. It wasn't just about designing a building; we needed to craft a space that converses with the climate, can be built by the local people using their own means, and fosters culture and solidarity.

While focusing on this goal, our real test took place right at the drafting table. As the team grew, we learned firsthand how challenging decision-making can be. Everyone wants the project to reach its best possible form, and no one has bad intentions; yet, finding a common ground that everyone feels genuinely good about requires tremendous effort. Moreover, when your teammates are also your close friends, things get even more delicate. You don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, so saying 'let's change this' or 'this detail isn't working' can become quite stressful after a certain point.

The critical turning point of our design process was the structural system. Initially, inspired by a reference project we really liked, we envisioned a strong truss structure for the building. However, as we developed the design, we realized that interrupting the continuous flow of this load-bearing section would contradict the structural logic and physics keeping the building standing. Structural logic and spatial constraints were really putting pressure on us.

To be honest, letting go of that initial concept hurt a bit at first. But with a radical decision, we shifted the design into two adjacent yet offset volumes. We positioned the truss system at the core as a linear circulation spine and crafted a climate-responsive envelope using rosewood structural members and sliding bamboo panels.

Frankly, even though leaving that first design behind was tough, I am much happier with the final outcome. The building not only settled into a statically sound logic, but it also fully achieved that 'breathable community space' atmosphere we envisioned—filtering out Senegal's harsh winter winds while welcoming the cooling summer breezes.

The Kaira Looro journey taught us far more than just materials, statics, and climatic design. It showed us how precious communication, flexibility, active listening, and—above all—creating a 'shared design language' really are. It was a challenging, sleepless, but truly rewarding experience that made us look at the final boards and proudly say, 'We accomplished this together.'