Aprovecho Research Center (ARC) is dedicated to researching, developing, and disseminating appropriate technological solutions for meeting the basic human needs of refugees and impoverished people.

Aprovecho Research Center was established in 1976 as a research and education center dedicated to researching appropriate technology and sustainable living. In 2006, ARC became a 501(c)3 non-profit dedicated to developing clean cookstove technologies for meeting the basic needs of refugees, impoverished people, and communities in the developing world. ARC has been the world’s leader in open source development of all aspects of improved cooking stoves. Consultants work with non-profit, for-profit, and government agencies around the world to test, develop and produce better cookstoves.

The specific tasks of ARC include designing/redesigning biomass stoves to achieve improved heat transfer and combustion efficiency while working in the field with users to assure the effectiveness and market viability of the new stove, manufacturing and selling the Laboratory Emissions Monitoring System (LEMS) to measure harmful emissions from biomass stoves, training laboratory and field staff to set up and operate the LEMS, and working with factories to build a new generation of clean-burning stoves. 

In 1980, Larry Winiarski, Technical Director of Aprovecho, began developing the rocket stove and rediscovered the principles of the systems developed by the Romans in hypocaust heating and cooking systems. A number of variations on these stoves have been created over the years, often designed specifically to suit the country in which they are being used, as they are now sold worldwide. In field tests in India, rocket stoves used 18 to 35 percent less fuel than traditional stoves, and reduced fuel used by 39-47 percent compared to traditional open three-stone fire stoves.

Currently, ARC is learning how the use of carbon-neutral biomass energy can heat more homes and generate more electricity. Residential and commercial energy use make up 13% of USA greenhouse emissions. Electricity creation produces 25%. ARC is investigating how to design (and manufacture) clean-burning pellet and log-burning heating stoves, hoping to generate clean combustion with forced draft and optimized heat transfer efficiency.

In addition, as recent research has found that biomass-heating stoves can result in health problems in densely populated areas, ARC is working with the EPA to explore ways to define PM2.5 emission rates for residential biomass heating stoves that would protect health in densely populated cities. 

Al Borde is a collaborative and experimental architecture studio that uses participatory processes and research to work within extreme constraints.

Founded in 2007 in Ecuador’s capital of Quito, Al Borde is led by architects Pascual Gangotena, David Barragán, Maria Luisa Borja, and Esteban Benavides. The studio first gained attention in 2009, when the team accepted a commission to design and construct a school in the coastal village of Cabuyal, Costa Rica, with a budget of only $200. 

The project, which was named “Escuela Nueva Esperanza, or “New Hope School,” proved the importance of participatory planning and collaboration. As is common in social design, solutions successful in some contexts could not necessarily be applied to this one. For example, when planning the construction, the team considered the use of recycled materials. However, while recycled materials may be an option in urban settings with excessive waste, in the small beach village where the school was to be built, waste was scarce. As a result, there were no materials to be recycled. Instead, through an investigative process founded on community engagement, the team was able to develop a keen understanding of the resources locally available for the project. 

Beginning with Escuela Nueva Esperranza, Al Borde continued on to develop three “Hope Projects” with the community, leading to an ongoing relationship. The process itself was catalytic, turning an entire village into designers and builders. Over time, members of the community started integrating the discovered materials and design strategies into their own self-built structures. The work of Al Borde elegantly illustrates how in the world of social design, constraint leads to creativity.

Al Borde’s now expanded work, including projects like the Culunco house, a semi-buried family home, and the House of the Flying Beds, a renovated historic property in the city of Ibarra, has continued to garner global attention. The studio has been featured in landmark exhibitions, including “Reporting from the Front” at the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennial, and was shortlisted for the Swiss Architectural Award in 2018. 

More recently, the studio has been working on projects in emergency contexts. For instance, their Post-Earthquake Prototype was developed following the earthquake that shook the coast of Ecuador in April 2016.                                 

We had an opportunity to speak with David Barragán about how design can empower a community to become their own designers and builders on Social Design Insights. Listen to the episode below.

Cameron Sinclair and Kate Stohr, recipients of the first Curry Stone Design Prize Vision Award, have been committed to social impact design since co-founding Architecture for Humanity in 1999. Concerned by reports of a growing refugee crisis in Kosovo, they took action by creating links between people in post-disaster areas with architects and designers. Early efforts included a competition for innovative refugee housing designs that brought a response from 220 architects and resulted in Architecture for Humanity’s first transitional housing prototype. Sinclair and Stohr used Architecture for Humanity’s growing network to shepherd reconstruction projects, responding to post-disaster devastation sites hit by the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004 and Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

For close to fifteen years Architecture for Humanity leveraged the goodwill and expertise of architects worldwide who collaborated on community-led design/build projects. The organization identified and provided funding for local partners, from construction managers to case workers. It hired local architects and paired them with design fellows who could help apply lessons learned from years of reconstruction work, and it provided oversight on construction quality as well as long-term monitoring of project outcomes.

To help facilitate this work, Architecture for Humanity created the Open Architecture Network, the first open-source community dedicated to improving living conditions through sustainable design. The site, which had 41,954 members, posted open-source architectural plans, drawings, and CAD files, and provided the platform for Architecture for Humanity’s design competitions.

Architecture for Humanity had 59 chapters in 16 countries and completed more than 200 projects. Staffers and volunteers built schools in West Africa and Haiti, managed multisite programs for sports and cultural centers in South Africa and South America, and worked on long-term rebuilding efforts along the U.S. Gulf Coast, in India, in Myanmar, in Sri Lanka, and in Japan.

Architecture for Humanity’s hallmark was its sensitivity to sustainability and community needs. One of its most recognized collaborations is a series of sports and education centers for the Football for Hope Movement, which uses football as a tool for reconciliation in post-conflict areas and as a draw to get disadvantaged youth to participate in life skills and job training. The Kimisagara Football for Hope Centre, in Kigali, Rwanda, was designed with a focus on sustainability: concrete was minimized and replaced where possible with local stone, brick, and compressed earth. A large shading roof, which extends over activity areas, harnesses rainwater that is filtered for potability. The football pitch also collects rainwater used for flushing toilets, washing clothes, and irrigating the landscape. Water storage and filtration facilities were constructed from shipping containers. Solar-powered LED lights allow the center to be safe at night. Architecture for Humanity designed the football pitch and community center so that they connect to and activate a pedestrian walkway along a nearby canal; this makes the center accessible from the dense residential core and allows better access to this water source and the informal vendor areas and public spaces that line it.

Architecture for Humanity works against the one-size-fits-all attitude prevalent in post-disaster reconstruction. For the Biloxi Model Home program, implemented in Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina, the group paired families with a team of designers to work side-by-side on new homes that were affordable and sustainable but personalized. For example, Architecture for Humanity devised a shifted, double bungalow design that wraps around an oak tree in the center of a property owned by the Nguyen family, which included four teenage children. The tree had been the site of family cookouts and the wraparound design allowed this tradition to continue on the shared deck (the original house had floated 50 feet down the street).

Work in the Gulf Coast produced one of Architecture for Humanity’s hallmarks: starting reconstruction projects by building a “design center” that serves as a one-stop resource for the affected community, providing access to everything from financial assistance to design services. Shaped by the communities they serve, these design centers can take on surprising forms: in northern Japan, a wish from fishermen for a place to get “hot noodles and a beer” prompted Architecture for Humanity’s team to build a beer garden from reclaimed materials, which became a space where residents came together to discuss reconstruction.

Sinclair and Stohr’s influence on the humanitarian design community extends far beyond Architecture for Humanity’s completed works. They are the coauthors of the best-selling book Design Like You Give a Damn: Architectural Responses to Humanitarian Crises (Metropolis Books, 2006). With case studies of innovative and sustainable social design solutions, Design Like You Give a Damn has served as a call to action for designers and architects around the globe. A second volume, Building Change From the Ground Up, was published in 2012 to similar acclaim.

In the fifteen years they led Architecture for Humanity, Cameron Sinclair and Kate Stohr helped bring design thinking to humanitarian aid and have set the bar high for post-disaster reconstruction. Moreover, they’ve created important resources that help architects share inspiration and bring their projects to fruition.

Auroville Earth Institute (AVEI) is a pioneering organization that has led in research and implementation of earth-based & sustainable building.

Over the last 32 years, AVEI has become one of the world’s top centers for excellence in earthen architecture, working in 38 countries to promote and disseminate knowledge in the construction of sustainable habitats. Part research institute, part training facility, Auroville leads workshops and discussions around the world on how to use the earth to develop a more sustainable built environment. Their work is widely influential, inspiring multiple groups and organizations to take up the practice of sustainable building. 

As the Representative and Resource Centre for Asia of the UNESCO Chair “Earthen Architecture, Constructive Cultures, and Sustainable Development,” AVEI aims to empower local stakeholders through an international network of experts. The work of the Earth Institute has attempted to revive traditional skills and to link vernacular traditions of raw earth construction with modern technologies of stabilized earth.

AVEI specializes in research and development of earthen technologies that are cost effective, low carbon, and low embodied energy solutions for sustainable development. This includes Compressed Stabilised Earth Blocks (CSEB) walls, Hollow Interlocking (HI CSEB) walls for disaster resistance, CSEB arches, vaults and domes, Stabilised Rammed Earth Foundations (SREF), Stabilised Rammed Earth Walls (SREW), earth composite technologies for columns and beams, stabilised earth waterproofing, plasters and mortars, etc. The most promoted AVEI technology today is Compressed Stabilised Earth Blocks. 

In addition, since 1990, the Auroville Earth Institute has educated over 13,770 people from 92 countries in sustainable building technologies and land management practices, focusing on the use of the earth as a building material. Knowledge is disseminated through training courses, seminars, workshops, manuals, and other publications.

In post-disaster conditions, Auroville’s techniques allow communities to self-recover without relying on the bureaucracy of foreign governments or international NGOs. For areas that are seismically vulnerable, Auroville is developing and implementing types of reinforced earth blocks that are as safe as any ‘modern’ form of construction. Additionally, the Institute has expanded into developing building equipment. It has designed, manufactured, and distributed presses in collaboration with private partners. In conjunction with the training provided, the materials enable communities to produce structural materials from local resources.

Over its history, AVEI has worked in 38 countries to promote and disseminate knowledge in earth architecture, and has garnered 15 awards for its work (four international awards and eleven national awards).

The Asian Coalition for Housing Rights (ACHR) is a broad coalition of grassroots community organizations, NGOs, architects and engineers currently working in 215 cities across Asia.

ACHR was established in 1988 in response to public evictions in South Korea before the Summer Olympics. The coalition’s philosophy is simple: decent housing is a fundamental human right. Unfortunately, as Asian cities have seen explosive growth in the last few decades, large populations have been forcibly moved from city centers to make room for development. 

In its 25 years of operation, ACHR has expanded to include a variety of supportive activities on many scales. It supports small-scale upgrades and community improvements, as well as larger city-wide initiatives. The work of ACHR details the significant challenges faced as the human population becomes increasingly urban, and our cities transform overnight into megacities.

Currently, the ACHR coalition’s work has come to a new stage of scale and action: the ACCA Program, which brings together many of the elements the ACCA groups have developed over the years. The program allows people in a city to come together, think, look at their problems, and take action to fix them, using the simple tools the program offers. As this action by people grows in scale and strength around the Asia region, it becomes a new, proactive political process also, in which the poor are winning support for their initiatives from their local governments and other local stakeholders and becoming vital and accepted development actors in their cities. The ACCA Program is now supporting groups in 165 cities, in 19 Asian countries to take action in different ways to show visible change by people, to show that poor people themselves can make this change, and to show this change happening at scale.

We had an opportunity to speak with The Asian Coalition for Housing Rights about their methods and strategies on Social Design Insights. Listen to the episode below.

Atelier d’Architecture Autogérée (AAA), is a collective of architects who transform urban spaces through collaborative, localized endeavors. The collective conducts explorations, actions, and research concerning urban mutations and cultural, social, and political emerging practices in the contemporary city.

Founded in 2001 by Franco-Romanian architects Constantin Petcouand and Doina Petrescu, AAA stages creative urban interventions that involve neighborhood residents in re-imagining unused, derelict spaces; for example, establishing a community hub in a pass-through between buildings or planting a self-sufficient vegetable garden in an area between high rises formerly used as a place to throw refuse. AAA acts as a platform for collaborative research and action on the city and much of their work is carried out with other specialists, artists, researchers, and institutional partners such as universities, arts organizations, and NGOs, as well as the eventual users of their spaces. Whilst the founding members of aaa remain, the practice operates as a collaborative network that forms around each project.

In a project titled Rhyzom, the team started with a survey of models of sustainable community living around Europe. After mapping examples of co-housing, small-scale agriculture, and cottage industry, they translated their observations into workshops in green roof design, rainwater collection systems, waste recycling, food growing, and handicrafts.

Taking their findings further, AAA developed R-Urban, a prototype for sustainable city life on the outskirts of Paris. In the working-class suburb of Colombes, the team created a living laboratory for the local residents to produce their own food supply and recycle waste, closing the local loops of consumption and production. The multi-year plan included ecological construction, urban agriculture, a recycling program, and cooperative housing.

While AAA has become an engine for engaging citizens in shaping their own cities through experimentation and renewal of derelict urban space, Doina has thoughtfully dovetailed this work into her own pedagogy, exposing students to radical ideas of how faculty, students, and communities can deconstruct social hierarchies and work together to create better communities. Currently, she serves as the Head of Research at the University of Sheffield School of Architecture. 

We had a chance to speak with Doina about her philosophy, of both work and teaching, on Social Design Insights. Join co-hosts Eric Cesal and Karen Kubey as they explore new directions in design teaching.

And don’t forget to check out Doina’s recommendations for further study!

Sustainable Health Enterprises (SHE) has designed a menstrual pad made from banana tree fibers—a local, renewable resource that SHE sources from two (largely female) farming co-ops in the eastern region of the country.

In numerous developing nations, the stigmatization of menstruation and the lack of access to affordable sanitary supplies have serious developmental and economic consequences for women. According to Sustainable Health Enterprises (SHE), 18% of women and girls in Rwanda miss out on school and work because they cannot afford menstrual pads. Sometimes they even feel forced to substitute rags, mud and leaves which is not only humiliating, it can lead to infection and disease. Most will simply stay home from school or work while menstruating. In Rwanda alone this translates to a possible GDP loss of $115 million each year.

In 2008, Founder and Chief Instigating Officer Elizabeth Scharpf witnessed this phenomenon among factory workers in Mozambique while on an internship for the World Bank. She started SHE with the goal of providing women with greater access to both menstrual products and basic health education. Her interest ultimately led her to Rwanda. There, the organization looked to existing women’s groups and community health networks to create a micro capital business model that would allow local manufacture and distribution of the pads. 

SHE seeks to build business opportunities in every stage of its production process.  It provides equipment and training to Rwandan banana farmers so that they can process the fiber and sell it to SHE—providing incremental revenue opportunities from something that was once discarded.  The fiber is brought to its community factory to be cut, carded, washed and solar dried. Finally, it is made into menstrual pads that are sold affordably to women and girls. 

SHE’s return on investment helps fund wider health initiatives like educating both men and women about the basic aspects of menstrual hygiene management and advocating with the Rwandan government to support access to menstrual products and health services countrywide.

As of 2019, SHE reported that 4.3 million people had been reached through advocacy and media, 60,101 girls and women had access to the organization’s Go! pads, and 793,590 Go! Pads had been made and sold. SHE has a full-time operation in Rwanda, and offices in New York City.

A professional service and outreach program of Mississippi State University’s College of Architecture, Art + Design, Gulf Coast Community Design Studio (GCCDS) was established in Biloxi, Mississippi in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to provide design services to devastated communities throughout the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Over time, it has evolved to address long-term issues of equitable community resilience.

Early in its history, GCCDS focused on providing permanent rebuilding and retrofits for residents of Biloxi. Immediately after the hurricane, David Perkes, the Mississippi State professor who has led the Studio since its inception, realized the importance of getting homeowners involved in the redesign of their houses. This differed from other agencies which were only offering two or three design options.

Community and environmental resilience work means planning for acute disasters, such as hurricanes, as well as considering slow-change impacts such as sea level rise, urbanization, and economic inequity.  GCCDS addresses both aspects of resilience with the understanding that working on day-to-day issues such as storm-water management, strong and affordable housing, and community-driven decision-making will prepare a community for acute threats as well.

GCCDS works with historic, low-income communities that have been impacted by expanded flood zones, assisting with mitigation to houses and landscape projects to increase the capacity of flood ways with tidal marsh restoration.  Such projects not only increase infrastructure resilience but also lead to more community environmental stewardship.

As the arc of recovery continues, the work of the Studio evolves. Its portfolio now includes projects focused on long-term sustainability and community prosperity. GCCDS has emerged as a national leader in best practices for its community-driven approach.  Through direct and continuous contact with the community over the long term, the Studio has functioned not only as a place to gather design assistance, but also as a genuine community hub. For example, the Studio hosts weekly gatherings, called “Friday Morning Serial” with a variety of community leaders telling the story of their work, so people can gather, chat and learn.

Since 2017, GCCDS has expanded its multidisciplinary studio staff to include a public health professional in addition to the planners, landscape and building architects in order to more effectively address the social determinants of health.

The Foundation for Achieving Seamless Territory (FAST) is an architectural think tank that initiates and develops cross-disciplinary research, advocacy, and design projects on the intersection between architecture, planning, and human rights.

FAST seeks to make systemic violence visible while improving the quality of the built environment and consequently, people’s livelihoods. The drive behind the creation of the think-tank began with a challenge posed by a Palestinian community of internally displaced persons, Ein Hawd. The community needed a planning alternative to the one imposed by the Israeli government. They wished to have a masterplan, with which they could negotiate with governmental bodies and claim access to civic rights and services. To propose a solution, the founders decided to address the role of architecture in times of crisis. The first project, One Land Two Systems, focused on Ein Hawd. Since then, many projects, publications, and exhibitions have followed. 

Since their first project, FAST has worked in various countries including Georgia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Kosovo, and the Netherlands, though most of its recent projects have explored the Israeli­-Palestinian conflict. One notable project is the long-term collaborative research project BLUE: Architecture of UN Peacekeeping Missions and Design for legacy, which examines and makes UN peace missions’ impact on cities and communities visible. 

The book authored by founding director, Malkit Shoshan, called Atlas of the Conflict, outlines the 100­ year history of the conflict through maps and diagrams. Like much of FAST’s work, it explores settlements, borders, and displacement— and the architect or urban planner’s conscious or unconscious role in contributing to the landscape of conflict. 

Current work examines the impact of UN peace operations in conflict zones, and how collaboration can lead to higher degrees of urban resilience.

We had an opportunity to speak with Malkit Shoshan about the architecture of conflict on our podcast, Social Design Insights. Listen to the episode below.

Estudio Teddy Cruz + Forman is at the vanguard of evolving urban practice. Together, Teddy Cruz and Fonna Forman have pushed a quiet revolution in the culture of U.S. planning by attempting to move civic imagination away from the legacy of post-war suburban planning. Central to their work is a reimagining of the role of “borders,” using San Diego/Tijuana as a laboratory. Conventional planning methodologies understand borders as something to be defended; reinforcing the idea of an inherent conflict between two sides which in fact does not necessarily exist. Through their work, which includes urban intervention projects, art installations and civic engagement, Cruz and Forman argue that borders are better thought of as places of exchange and innovation. For example, while current political discourse, reinforced by the mainstream media, presents the US/Mexico border as a place of criminalization, Cruz and Forman want to elevate it as a site of creativity.

The practice was founded in 2000 by Cruz, an American architect, urbanist, and educator. Fonna Forman, a noted political theorist, joined the practice in 2010. Both are currently professors at the University of California, San Diego. They are also directors of the UCSD Cross-Border Initiative.

Estudio Teddy Cruz + Forman has worked at many scales and in many contexts. Much of their work focuses on the activation of small spaces – taking neglected urban areas and developing them into community resources. Through this approach, planners and architects can begin to transform neighborhoods under the nose of existing and ossified zoning psychologies.

Simultaneously, Estudio Teddy Cruz + Forman has been at the frontier of blending design and policy. Historically, there has been very little collaboration between the leaders of Tijuana and San Diego, despite their proximity and shared resources (such as a watershed). In 2013, Forman and Cruz were recruited by San Diego mayor Bob Filner to develop the Civic Innovation Lab – an ambitious project to bring designers into City Hall and develop new practices for engaging marginalized communities and strengthening the urban relationship with Tijuana. Although the project was short-lived, it remains one of the few examples where such an integration was attempted in the U.S.

We had an opportunity to have an extended conversation with Teddy Cruz and Fonna Forman on Social Design Insights. Listen to the episodes below.