Aid by Design: Understanding Humanitarian and Development Architecture

Humanitarian architecture - or the ’architecture of aid’ - has seen phenomenal growth worldwide over the last decade, as architects have responded to an increasingly urgent need to connect socially responsible design to ongoing efforts in humanitarian aid. Whether providing ground-breaking designs for post-disaster shelter, or as part of wider economic development programmes (for example school-building in the developing world) - it is clear that architects have a vital role to play, delivering innovative design solutions for humanitarian relief and aid programmes.

But how successful are these solutions? In the rush to offer a simplified toolkit, the complex challenges and long-term consequences of humanitarian architecture are often overlooked and under-examined.

Aid by Design explores these questions. Beginning with an accessible introduction for architects to the field of development, it examines how architectural aid projects link to the processes of international humanitarian and development aid. It engages with the funders, designers, and users of today’s aid-built interventions through a range of global case studies - including schools, hospitals, and emergency and low-cost housing - and reviews the architectural ambitions of each work alongside its ethical, social and economic consequences. By considering the real-world practicalities of culture, economy and development policy, the aim is to allow architects to better understand the successes, failures, and challenges of aid architecture and produce more workable, sustainable solutions for a better world.

Case study practices include: Arup; Elemental; Open Architecture Collaborative (Architecture for Humanity); and Shigeru Ban, while case study locations range from Africa to South East Asia to Latin America.

Ola Uduku is Professor of Architecture at the Manchester School of Architecture, University of Manchester, UK.