Isooko Community Development Center

This project was selected as a Merit winner in ARCHITECT's 2024 Architecture & Interiors Awards, Special Entry: Design for Impact category.

“I was really struck by the intentionality of how they sourced and fabricated the materials, which is interesting in terms of its sustainability model.” –Juror John Frane

The Isooko Community Development Center is designed to support both communities and the environment. It comprises a variety of indoor and outdoor spaces that serve the rural communities around the village of Masoro in Rwanda, providing a safe environment for learning, play, and wellness. The center offers numerous services to the local community, including a library and children's learning area, multi-generational classrooms, technology education rooms, exercise and event spaces, a community teaching garden, an outdoor theater, and both a basketball court and a soccer pitch. The project was inclusive, engaging the local community to leverage indigenous knowledge, incorporate both new and traditional building techniques, and use locally sourced, low-impact materials. This holistic approach included employing and training 390 local residents—54% of whom were women—to help design, build, and manage the project. These strategies and the collaboration with the local community helped us better understand the project’s environmental and social climate, implement an ethically sourced and thoughtfully assembled supply chain for materials, and establish fair and equitable labor practices.

More than half of the building materials were sourced on-site, and over eighty-five percent were sourced regionally (within 100 kilometers). These materials included clay, sand, and stone for foundations and walls, as well as local grasses, woods, and eucalyptus bark for screens, sun shading, and acoustic dampening. We recruited and trained a local workforce, hiring under-employed villagers with no prior construction experience to build using seismically stable techniques like SRCCD’s ModernBrick system, which uses locally sourced raw materials and requires less mortar. For smaller spaces, we used Interlocking Stabilized Soil Blocks (ISSBs), made on-site without petrochemical components. The building also features off-grid technologies, including rainwater catchment and retention systems, landscape formations for seating and rainwater management, biodigester systems for toilets and composting, passive ventilation, natural daylighting for 80% of lighting needs, and solar panels for electrical power.

As a design nonprofit working in rural East African communities, we spent years building partnerships with community leaders, local artists and industries, governmental agencies, and both local and international NGOs to ensure that the Center became an actively used space for and by the community. It serves as a place for learning and engagement in sustainability, wellness, and community initiatives. These partnerships, especially with local residents, were crucial in defining goals and creating the project vision. After opening, we trained community partners in sustainable management and energy use practices. Today, community members collectively decide how to use and manage the center, which they helped create. The Isooko Community Development Center represents a new approach to community commons, made possible by applying a comprehensive design process to every aspect of the project.

PROJECT CREDITS:
Project: Isooko Community Development Center
Location: Masoro Sector, Rulindo District, Northern Province, the Republic of Rwanda
Client/Owner: Isooko Community Development
Architect: GAC: James Setzler (co-founder & managing partner), Yutaka Sho (co-founder), Leighton Beaman (co-founder & AIA Associate), Patrice Ndababonye, Nicolas Kalimba Rugamba, Marie Claire Musengayire, Cynthia Twagirayezu, Marie Rose Ukwizabigira, Iris Gomm, Mia Shepard
Construction Start Date: Phase 01(June 2018); Phase 02 (August 2021)
Construction End Date: Phase 01 (August 2021); Phase 02 (November 2023)
Interior Designer: GAC
Structural Engineer: Junho Chun
Electrical Engineer: Great Lakes Energy
Civil Engineer: Riflo (bio-digester systems)
Construction Manager: GAC
General Contractor: GAC
Landscape Architect: GAC
Lighting Designer: GAC

Other Consultants:
SKAT (Modern-Bricks training)
Kate Spade NY, On Purpose (Programs)
Teach Rwanda (Education + Programs)
Kigali Public Library (library systems and book donations)
Mind Leaps (dance and education)
Inkomoko (financial literacy programs)
Gardens for Health International (Landscape & Programs)
Shooting Touch (Sports Initiatives + facilities)
Africa Yoga Project (Yoga and Mental Health Initiatives)
Rutongo Mines (land & infrastructure)
Size in Square Feet: 11840 sf
Cost: $450,000

MATERIALS AND SOURCES:
According to GAC, the majority of the materials for this project are sources on site or in the region from local growers, kilns, gardens, etc and fabricated on-site. GAC worked with a number of local artisans and fabricators rather than from industrial or building products services. In doing so there are few suppliers, sub-contractors, or consultants they could list.

Acoustical System: local reeds & grasses (fabricated in place)
Exterior Wall Systems: SKAT (Modern Brick System)
Lighting Control Systems: Great Lakes Energy, Rwanda
Lighting: Great Lakes Energy, Rwanda
Masonry and Stone: GAC (locally sourced)
Photovoltaics or other Renewables: Great Lakes Energy, Rwanda
Plumbing and Water System: Riflo, Kenya(bio-digester)
Rainwater Catchment System (GAC)
Roofing: Onduline, Germany (recycled bitumen roof panels)
Site and Landscape Products: Stone (site sourced)
Shooting Touch, USA (Basketball court)
Structural System: SKAT (Modern Brick System)
Concrete (cast-in-place)
Steel (fabricated on-site)
Walls: SKAT (Modern Brick System)
Windows and Doors: Custom (built on-site)