Compound Communities

Combined

“The compound house has long provided the accommodation required by low-income households in West African cities.”

-   Jørgen Eskemose Andersen

Andersen, Jorgen, Andreasen, Jorgen, and Tipple, Graham.  “The demise of compound houses – consequences for the low income population of Kumasi, Ghana.” RICS Research vol. 6 num. 8 Mar. 2006: 5-35.  28 October, 2008. 

Andersen and Andreasen are associate professors at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, as well as architects and town planners.  Graham Tipple is a Reader in Housing Policy and Development and an Associate Director of the Global Urban Research Unit in the School of Architecture at the University of Newcastle in Tyne, UK.  In this collaborative research paper, the authors discuss the key role compound housing has provided in low-income cities in West Africa.  The essay analyses the advantages and disadvantages of compound housing.  “Issues of privacy, image and communal life are usually cited by occupants dissatisfied with life in compound houses” state the authors in regards to complaints about compound living.  They then go on to state that: “However, they [compound housing] represent good value for money, cost little to build, suit traditional inheritance patterns, allow independent life at low cost, and allow sharing of services with a finite and known group.  Compound housing is also compact and suited to hot climates. It is noted that multi-habitation occurs in houses of other designs but the courtyard is replaced by access corridors, with some loss of amenity.”  The rest of the essay examines different compounds in different parts of West Africa, and brings up the fact that instead of new compounds being built, the cities are seeing “affluent villa-style” developments.  The three authors then conclude that there is a definite need to develop “new forms of housing with the advantages of compound housing but which fit into new perceptions of what is acceptable urban life to the growing cohort of young family households.”

 

Reading about compound housing was interesting and beneficial.  While I am not looking to photograph compound neighborhoods, I am looking for pre-fabricated buildings, or buildings that were designed with minimal cost in mind.  After reading this essay, it was made quite clear that saving money and using cheap material/minimal space is one of the allures for architects and city planners when designing compound communities.  Keeping this in mind, I will continue to look for buildings to photograph in more run-down, or impoverished places, since they will generally reflect the economic standings of the area.