Addis Ababa as a Palimpsest

The goal of the Global Housing graduation studio is to research and design housing solutions to improve the livelihood of Addis Ababa’s urban dwellers. Combining analysis, planning and design, the participants in this graduation studio are challenged to use multidisciplinary research methods and tools to elaborate design proposals for mass...

Making a Living: Integrating informal income generation schemes into formal urban housing redevelopment as foundation for future economic growth and urban densification

Ethiopia is forecast to be the fastest growing economy in Sub-Saharan Africa. Partly due to this economic growth, the urban population is expected to increase significantly in the coming decades. In the group of urban migrants, more than half comes from rural areas, indicating a large sum of poorly educated, low skilled workers as major part of...

Rediscovering the Roots of the City: Creating Synergy Between Addis Ababa’s Urban Dwellers and Rivers

This project seeks for an alternative low-cost housing strategy for the city of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Currently, the condominium housing scheme is implemented everywhere throughout the city. Despite the impressive amount of newly constructed dwelling units, shortcomings of this housing strategy have drastic consequences within the social and...

Radical Vernacular: A New Ethiopian Urbanity

Addis Ababa is a city experiencing a huge population boom, and where the vast majority of housing can be classified as “slum”. State-owned kebele housing, which houses an estimated 40% of the city’s inhabitants, has very low rents but is not maintained, leading to deterioration. Thus, the city is left with a severe shortage of adequate housing....

Mengeste

This graphic novel is the result of a micro-ethnographic research to Kechene, a district of Addis Ababa. Using graphic techniques borrowed from the architecture discipline, this graphic novel aims at bringing together representations of everyday life in the Kechene sefer (neighbourhood), that show how human life shapes its environment and vice...

Gerji World

This graphic novel is the result of a micro-ethnographic research to Gerji, a district of Addis Ababa. Using graphic techniques borrowed from the architecture discipline, this graphic novel aims at bringing together representations of everyday life in the Gerji neighbourhood, that show how human life shapes its environment and vice versa. This...

Kolfe Low-Cost Housing Site

This graphic novel is the result of a micro-ethnographic research to Kolfe, a neighbourhood in Addis Ababa. Using graphic techniques borrowed from the architecture discipline, this graphic novel aims at bringing together representations of everyday life in Kolfe, that show how human life shapes its environment and vice versa. This graphic novel...

Towards the Summit

This graphic novel is the result of a micro-ethnographic research to Summit, a district of Addis Ababa. Using graphic techniques borrowed from the architecture discipline, this graphic novel aims at bringing together representations of everyday life in Summit, that show how human life shapes its environment and vice versa. This graphic novel not...

The Hooded Man of Mickeyleland

This graphic novel is the result of a micro-ethnographic research to Mickeyleland, a neighbourhood of Addis Ababa. Using graphic techniques borrowed from the architecture discipline, this graphic novel aims at bringing together representations of everyday life in the Mickeyleland neighbourhood, that show how human life shapes its environment and...

Addis Ababa Living Lab: Dwelling in Ethiopia

This research booklet brings together a selection of data and spatial analysis of dwelling types and housing policies and programmes in Ethiopia – in general – with a particular focus on the case of Addis Ababa. This booklet uses historical iconography, archival research and a selection of bibliographic references, to produce a wide range of...

Condominium 3.0: Reinventing Addis Ababa’s Mass Housing Projects for the City and it’s Low-Income Dwellers

The project is a part of the Global Dwelling studio in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The focus of the studio is on Affordable Housing for the Global Urban South. This project looks to continue with the current method of affordable housing in Addis Ababa in the form of mass housing condominiums. These developments are appearing in huge numbers across...