Kampala by Design

Demas Nwoko’s design philosophy stressed the importance of beauty and significant sustainability, a message that travelled beyond Nigeria to Kampala, Uganda.

Editor’s note: This essay is available in our print issue, Demas Nwoko’s Natural Synthesis and the Rise of African Architecture. Buy the issue here.

When I was younger, I was told that this place was named after impalas. I imagined a stretch of wilderness decorated by gentle beasts and a white man in dark green safari attire baptizing the savannah woodlands, Kampala. It’s only after years of eavesdropping on Kalundi Serumaga that I learnt that before the imperialists/ explorers came, indigenous folk had their own vast and modern imagination for their stretch of wilderness. In hindsight, this should have been obvious.

I would like to highlight the modern because so often we imagine pre-colonial to be primitive or behind as an alternative to mainstream, current thought. Like architect and artist, Demas Nwoko, also argued, it is important that we see indigenous thought as modern, as forward-thinking such that we encourage its continuity and not stunt it as tradition. The draw to indigenous thought for me and many others I believe is not a superiority race, but a direction chosen out of the practical usefulness of indigenous thought to cater to the realities of colonized and oppressed peoples.

This feature essay is an exploration of three works, all within Kampala, Uganda that emulate the philosophy that unequivocally drove Nwoko. A desire to achieve natural synthesis in his projects. Utilizing organic materials from the lands where he was working. He picked up the generational call to decolonization and from the University of Ibadan attempted to release his and his peers’ minds from the chokehold that was neo-colonialism. While the Zaria art society as they came to be called, came as an obvious response to the lack of African teachers and thought in the curriculum, they were dubbed rebels by onlookers. The Zaria Rebels insisted on the continuation/ celebration of indigenous thought, and modernization. Nwoko’s work to date is interesting, bold, and creative. It does not suffer from the stuntedness of folks that pin Africa down to huts, granary and thatch. Within the authenticity, it is not just a return but a kind of leaping forward with great style and boundless imaginings. Lastly, Nwoko constantly argues that architecture cannot be separated from art. This is to say in not so many ways that buildings should be grand, should be cool, should make the occupant feel something. His notable works include the Dominican Mission Chapel, The Cultural Centre of Ibadan and the Benin Theatre.

I chose three buildings: the Kamwokya Community Centre, which is exceptional in its capacity to exist inconspicuously and still, yet remarkably for the marginalized community in Kampala’s ghettos. The Japanese Yamasen, which consulted with locals to build a modern environmentally friendly and sustainable solution in uptown Kampala and the pre-colonial United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) heritage site that preserved not just the tombs but the indigenous way of construction.

Often, Nwoko worked with raw materials and owing to his exceptional spatial understanding succeeded in achieving natural air circulation. For Uganda’s tropical climate, such spatial understanding is critical. Already achievable by the 19th century with the Kasubi tombs, this essay will also appreciate the mastery of convection currents evident at both Kasubi and Yamasen. The thatched roofing ensures that the structures are cool when it’s hot and warm when it’s cold. The community centre also achieves this with steel structures that allow for airflow. More impressively it conquers a flooding problem that is prevalent in the slum that it is located with butterfly roofing and a raised platform. The roofing system collects rainwater that can be utilized later. The raised platform complemented with an efficient drainage system protects the building from recurring floods. Given the climate crisis, I am most celebratory of the designs for their eco-friendliness.

Kampala is the capital city of Uganda, but also the royal capital of Buganda. The Baganda call it ‘kibuga’ which can be loosely translated to ‘city’. To understand the seismic conundrum that Kampala is in, the leading opposition figure, Robert Kyagulani Ssentamu, describes the city as no different from an apartheid territory. Some elite Baganda see the city as an occupied territory, given that their capital has been occupied by foreigners to their political marginalization and denigration; and others aspire for it to be a conglomeration of multi-cultural identities of cosmopolitan fashion. While there are many relevant ideological contests, the city is congested, has depleted sewage and drainage systems, bad roads, pollution and vast inequality, threatening the current semblance of harmony...

This essay features in our print issue, ‘Demas Nwoko’s Natural Synthesis and the Rise of African Architecture’, and is available to read for free. Simply register for a Free Pass to continue reading.

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