Transitional Housing for Returning Refugees: Kosovo 1999-2000
Architecture
is supposed to provide shelter. In early 1999, nowhere was the need for
shelter more critical than in the war-torn region of Kosovo.
Hundreds of thousands were without a place to live. Their homes in
ruins and the infrastructure of the region collapsed, the returning
population needed immediate and highly-dispersed temporary housing.
Architecture for Humanity hosted an open competition
to design five-year transitional housing for the returning people of
Kosovo. The competition's goal was to foster the development of housing
methods that would relieve suffering and speed the transition back to a
normal way of life. Architects and designers from 30 different
countries responded. We received more than 200 designs. From these, a jury selected 10 finalists and 20 notable entries.
Need
The people of Kosovo, like most people, had a strong commitment to
their homes. As the various relief agencies working in the area
predicted, people headed home at the first opportunity. Refugee-style
camps in Kosovo were not thought to be possible or desirable. With the
end of hostilities, three quarters of a million people or more were
spreading out to towns, villages and farms all over Kosovo. Once they
had returned, they faced a multitude of conditions that made normal
living impossible. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) reported that 40 to 50% of the houses in the war-torn region
were reduced to rubble. Mines and booby traps were widespread. Food was
in short supply, and water systems were often either destroyed or
poisoned, and electricity was unavailable in most places. The immediate
challenge was to shelter families until they could make their old homes
habitable.
Outcome
As a result of the competition and the publicity it generated,
prototypes of five competition entries have been built. Sean Godsell self-funded and built his shipping container inspired design in Australia. Mike Lawless,
a partner at LDA Architects, and Mark Whitby of Whitby, Bird and
Partners, built a prototype of their rubble and wire mesh-housing
scheme in Exeter, United Kingdom. The project was funded by SpaceX
Gallery. Another finalist, Techno Craft, also undertook and funded the building of a full-scale mockup of their inflatable hemp house in Tokyo, Japan. In 2000, Deborah Gans and Matthew Jelacic’s “Extreme House”
project was awarded $100,000 by the Johnnie Walker Keep Walking fund. A
full-scale model of the system was built for an exhibition at the
University of Pennsylvania in 2003.
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Entries
were exhibited in four countries and featured in more than 30
newspapers and design publications. Designs by three teams, I-Beam, SYSTEM Architects and Shigeru Ban
Architects, were selected and shown at the 7th International
Architecture Exhibition at the Biennale di Venezia (Venice). Publicity
from these exhibitions, as well as other fundraising activities, helped
to raise more than $120,000 for War Child, an international children’s
charity, which used the money to create housing, schools and medical
facilities in eight countries and Kosovo.
