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N. Aden
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Biyo iyo Baad (Water and Pasture) investigates what happens when a people whose identity is rooted in movement are asked to settle. Situated in the context of Somaliland's accelerating urbanisation, the project explores the transition from the ephemeral architecture of the pastoral nomad to the permanence of the city. As climate change disrupts seasonal migration patterns and diminishes pastoral livelihoods, many families find themselves inhabiting an intermediary condition; neither fully nomadic nor fully urban.
Rather than approaching architecture as a solution, the project understands it as an intervention into a moment of social and ecological transformation. The question at its core is not how to house the nomad, but how the rituals, memories, and forms of knowledge embedded within nomadic life might survive settlement. To what extent can ephemerality be maintained within a static dwelling? Can architecture continue to act as a site of community cohesion, female agency, and collective labour once movement has ceased?
Drawing from the building culture of the Aqal, the traditional Somali nomadic hut, the project investigates song, ritual, and construction as forms of architectural notation. Somali work songs were translated into spatial rules that informed the organisation of the project, transforming rhythm, repetition, and exchange into a language of form. Through this process, architecture became a means of representing journey rather than merely accommodating it.
Located on the edge of Hargeisa, where urban expansion meets the pastoral landscape, the proposal reimagines the communal watering hole as both infrastructure and social condenser. Housing, water collection, and productive spaces are organised around rituals of gathering and making. Constructed from locally available eucalyptus poles, earthen materials, and woven systems, the architecture remains lightweight, adaptable, and participatory.
The project proposes a typology that is neither fully permanent nor fully temporary. Instead, it exists in the space between, honouring a culture whose understanding of home has always been inseparable from the journey itself.
...
Rather than approaching architecture as a solution, the project understands it as an intervention into a moment of social and ecological transformation. The question at its core is not how to house the nomad, but how the rituals, memories, and forms of knowledge embedded within nomadic life might survive settlement. To what extent can ephemerality be maintained within a static dwelling? Can architecture continue to act as a site of community cohesion, female agency, and collective labour once movement has ceased?
Drawing from the building culture of the Aqal, the traditional Somali nomadic hut, the project investigates song, ritual, and construction as forms of architectural notation. Somali work songs were translated into spatial rules that informed the organisation of the project, transforming rhythm, repetition, and exchange into a language of form. Through this process, architecture became a means of representing journey rather than merely accommodating it.
Located on the edge of Hargeisa, where urban expansion meets the pastoral landscape, the proposal reimagines the communal watering hole as both infrastructure and social condenser. Housing, water collection, and productive spaces are organised around rituals of gathering and making. Constructed from locally available eucalyptus poles, earthen materials, and woven systems, the architecture remains lightweight, adaptable, and participatory.
The project proposes a typology that is neither fully permanent nor fully temporary. Instead, it exists in the space between, honouring a culture whose understanding of home has always been inseparable from the journey itself.
...
Biyo iyo Baad (Water and Pasture) investigates what happens when a people whose identity is rooted in movement are asked to settle. Situated in the context of Somaliland's accelerating urbanisation, the project explores the transition from the ephemeral architecture of the pastoral nomad to the permanence of the city. As climate change disrupts seasonal migration patterns and diminishes pastoral livelihoods, many families find themselves inhabiting an intermediary condition; neither fully nomadic nor fully urban.
Rather than approaching architecture as a solution, the project understands it as an intervention into a moment of social and ecological transformation. The question at its core is not how to house the nomad, but how the rituals, memories, and forms of knowledge embedded within nomadic life might survive settlement. To what extent can ephemerality be maintained within a static dwelling? Can architecture continue to act as a site of community cohesion, female agency, and collective labour once movement has ceased?
Drawing from the building culture of the Aqal, the traditional Somali nomadic hut, the project investigates song, ritual, and construction as forms of architectural notation. Somali work songs were translated into spatial rules that informed the organisation of the project, transforming rhythm, repetition, and exchange into a language of form. Through this process, architecture became a means of representing journey rather than merely accommodating it.
Located on the edge of Hargeisa, where urban expansion meets the pastoral landscape, the proposal reimagines the communal watering hole as both infrastructure and social condenser. Housing, water collection, and productive spaces are organised around rituals of gathering and making. Constructed from locally available eucalyptus poles, earthen materials, and woven systems, the architecture remains lightweight, adaptable, and participatory.
The project proposes a typology that is neither fully permanent nor fully temporary. Instead, it exists in the space between, honouring a culture whose understanding of home has always been inseparable from the journey itself.
Rather than approaching architecture as a solution, the project understands it as an intervention into a moment of social and ecological transformation. The question at its core is not how to house the nomad, but how the rituals, memories, and forms of knowledge embedded within nomadic life might survive settlement. To what extent can ephemerality be maintained within a static dwelling? Can architecture continue to act as a site of community cohesion, female agency, and collective labour once movement has ceased?
Drawing from the building culture of the Aqal, the traditional Somali nomadic hut, the project investigates song, ritual, and construction as forms of architectural notation. Somali work songs were translated into spatial rules that informed the organisation of the project, transforming rhythm, repetition, and exchange into a language of form. Through this process, architecture became a means of representing journey rather than merely accommodating it.
Located on the edge of Hargeisa, where urban expansion meets the pastoral landscape, the proposal reimagines the communal watering hole as both infrastructure and social condenser. Housing, water collection, and productive spaces are organised around rituals of gathering and making. Constructed from locally available eucalyptus poles, earthen materials, and woven systems, the architecture remains lightweight, adaptable, and participatory.
The project proposes a typology that is neither fully permanent nor fully temporary. Instead, it exists in the space between, honouring a culture whose understanding of home has always been inseparable from the journey itself.
The Aqal: House or Home
Using Retroactive Mapmaking to Document Transient Ephemeral Space in Somali Nomadic Dwellings
Sources note that more than a quarter of the Somali population are pastoral nomads, moving with their cattle in search of water sources and grazing. Their architecture and method of building has adapted to this way of life. The method of building an Aqal (a traditional Somali nomadic home) is an intrinsic part of Somali culture and is kept alive by the nomadic community. However despite this persisting tradition, the Aqals themselves are always temporary. This paper intends to explore the impact this temporality has on the user and their sense of space. Particularly pertaining to the sense of identity and comfort a person can attach to an item that is never exactly the same but still recognisable.
This thesis aims to use indigenous knowledge sharing methods such as oral retelling in the form of extensive open conversational style interviews with the authors mother, Canab Cali, who formerly lived nomadically and worked on constructing elements of the Aqal. There will be an extensive exploration in the extent to which temporality is reflected in other aspects of Somali culture and how the Aqal’s ephemeral architecture affirms or rejects common design theories proposed by western authors such as Richard Sennet, Nelson Goodman as well as utilising theories presented by Somali authors such as Maxamed Cartan Xaange and Mohamed Ibrahim Warsame (Hadrawi). ...
This thesis aims to use indigenous knowledge sharing methods such as oral retelling in the form of extensive open conversational style interviews with the authors mother, Canab Cali, who formerly lived nomadically and worked on constructing elements of the Aqal. There will be an extensive exploration in the extent to which temporality is reflected in other aspects of Somali culture and how the Aqal’s ephemeral architecture affirms or rejects common design theories proposed by western authors such as Richard Sennet, Nelson Goodman as well as utilising theories presented by Somali authors such as Maxamed Cartan Xaange and Mohamed Ibrahim Warsame (Hadrawi). ...
Sources note that more than a quarter of the Somali population are pastoral nomads, moving with their cattle in search of water sources and grazing. Their architecture and method of building has adapted to this way of life. The method of building an Aqal (a traditional Somali nomadic home) is an intrinsic part of Somali culture and is kept alive by the nomadic community. However despite this persisting tradition, the Aqals themselves are always temporary. This paper intends to explore the impact this temporality has on the user and their sense of space. Particularly pertaining to the sense of identity and comfort a person can attach to an item that is never exactly the same but still recognisable.
This thesis aims to use indigenous knowledge sharing methods such as oral retelling in the form of extensive open conversational style interviews with the authors mother, Canab Cali, who formerly lived nomadically and worked on constructing elements of the Aqal. There will be an extensive exploration in the extent to which temporality is reflected in other aspects of Somali culture and how the Aqal’s ephemeral architecture affirms or rejects common design theories proposed by western authors such as Richard Sennet, Nelson Goodman as well as utilising theories presented by Somali authors such as Maxamed Cartan Xaange and Mohamed Ibrahim Warsame (Hadrawi).
This thesis aims to use indigenous knowledge sharing methods such as oral retelling in the form of extensive open conversational style interviews with the authors mother, Canab Cali, who formerly lived nomadically and worked on constructing elements of the Aqal. There will be an extensive exploration in the extent to which temporality is reflected in other aspects of Somali culture and how the Aqal’s ephemeral architecture affirms or rejects common design theories proposed by western authors such as Richard Sennet, Nelson Goodman as well as utilising theories presented by Somali authors such as Maxamed Cartan Xaange and Mohamed Ibrahim Warsame (Hadrawi).