Architecture students from the University of Cambridge have built a shantytown at the entrance to the Eden Project.

Architecture sans Frontières, a Cambridge student society and part of an international network of architects engaging with developing countries, teamed up with the Eden Project last week for a five-day course entitled ‘Building Communities’. It was the first time such a course has been held in the UK.

The shantytown was built with waste materials from a new phase of building at the Eden Project. The contrast between the futuristic Biomes of Eden and the shacks, in which the majority of the world’s urban population live, was stark. Visitors to Eden peered into the shacks to see how one person’s waste becomes another person’s home.

The shack building exercise was just one of the learning exercises on the week-long course, which included seminars on technology, community planning, as a session on ‘Waste as an Asset’, lead by the Eden’s Sustainability Director, Chris Hines.

In this way, the course challenged the idea of ‘compartmentalised education’ where ‘first you learn, and then you do’. This course invited architects to do both, and to live in the shacks that they had built. The course also explored the technical responsibilities of professionals to ensure barriers to long-term community development are overcome.

The course was supported by the University of Cambridge Active Community Fund.

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