From project to reality: Community library and social recuperation

Presentation to winner of the LafargeHolcim Building Better Recognition (l-r): Daniel Bach, Area Manager LafargeHolcim for South East Asia and China congratulates Milinda Pathiraja, Director, Partner & Co-Founder, Robust Architecture Workshop, Colombo, Sri Lanka. The design for a community library in Ambepussa, Sri Lanka, built with the support of former army personnel engaged in the nation’s civil war, shows that “turning swords into ploughshares” can be realized even today.

The slip-form, rammed- earth wall construction process is projected as an opportunity to transfer technology to locals/soldiers. The subsequent training tasks are planned at an early design stage called “fabrication and training design”. Here, various components of the system and mould-work are delineated, the fabrication/training tolerances are defined, the production site (training ground), minimum module and sample labour gang (for training) are established, and fabrication steps are laid out.

Passive and cool: cross and stack ventilation in addition to use of renewable, recycled, zero-carbon emitting materials/processes reduce the building’s life-cycle cost.

Entry lobby: the main entry to the library is via the covered loggia. Technically innovative use of rammed-earth walls demonstrates the first attempt in Sri Lanka to use that material for such scale/type of building. Rammed-earth is sourced from an adjacent site undergoing excavation for a playground.

Daniel Bach, Area Manager LafargeHolcim for South East Asia and China, presents the first Building Better Recognition for Asia Pacific to Milinda Pathiraja, Director, Partner & Co-Founder, Robust Architecture Workshop, Colombo, Sri Lanka.

The army's human resource is assimilated for social building through carefully planned, on-site training initiatives. This reduces immediate labour costs and produces a skilled workforce, whose training expenditure is internalized within the project, thus saving on social cost.