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- Nkabom House, building with mud in Ghana
![Nkabom House, building with mud in Ghana Nkabom House, building with mud in Ghana](https://www.floornature.com/media/photos/38/10600/10_nkabom-house-building-with-mud-in-ghana_home_sez.jpg)
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Three young English architects - Anna Webster, Eliana Stenning and Phoebe Stock - designed and built “Nkabom House” in Abetenim arts village in Ghana, basing their work on local materials and infrastructure and collaborating with international volunteers.
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The project is much more than just a standard workshop of mud houses, because it also deals with a range of environmental issues connected to the specific situation of Ghana, to come up with an innovative response, while using traditional materials and techniques.
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So, in addition to the mud, they also repurposed pure water sachets as building materials - these sachets create many problems because there is no rubbish collection service and as we know plastic is highly polluting and dirty. But while the discarded plastic water sachets are a major issue, the fact that they are waterproof is actually a great advantage because they can be used for roofing instead of corrugated metal sheets.
A tangible example of recycling, something that not common practice in Ghana so there was a desire to get across the idea that something of beauty and value can be created from waste.
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Not only that but the workshop director, Anna Webster seeks a design approach that is removed from the primordial image of a mud house to turn it into a contemporary aesthetic: Nkabom House in the Abetenim arts village is a project that combines traditional, sustainable building with an intercultural exchange between architects, visitors and the local workforce, for a truly innovative visual impact.
Christiane Bürklein
Workshop and competition: Nka Foundation 2014 Mud House Design Competition, Reinventing the African Mud Hut Together
Project: Anna Webster, London Metropolitan University
Year: 2014
Location: Abetenim, Ghana
Photography: courtesy of Nka Foundation, http://www.transartists.org/air/nka-foundation