DesignBuildBLUFF architectural projects

DesignBuildBLUFF, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to provide architectural students with a real-world educational experience in physically connecting on-site to both the experimental and standardized aspects of design, announces its 2008 architectural projects.

Founded by professor Hank Lewis in 2000, DesignBuildBLUFF is affiliated with the University of Utah’s College of Architecture + Planning and designs and builds low cost, off-grid houses on the Navajo Nation Indian Reservation. Because of organizational needs, a Navajo home will not be built in 2008. Instead, a workshop/student housing dwelling and bathhouse will be built and DesignBuildBLUFF is fundraising to provide design/build assistance for the construction of a medical housing center for AIDS-orphaned children in the Ugandan village of Bira.

For the past eight years, DesignBuildBLUFF has worked with the Navajo Nation to create homes for Native American families in need. Thanks to a steady increase in enrollment, the student participants themselves are now faced with a housing shortage. To ensure that DesignBuildBLUFF is able to sustain itself and continue to grow, the focus this year will be on creating a new student housing facility.

Designed around three discarded steel shipping containers, the structure will incorporate a workshop, kitchenette, bathroom, and sleeping quarters for eight. Not only will this new facility create needed housing for students, but it will also facilitate DesignBuildBLUFF’s long-term goal of being able to prefabricate pieces in the workshop (such as passive solar rammed earth and trombe walls and water reclamation roofs) that can easily be transported to building sites on the reservation.

Also, the students are designing and building a bathhouse. Made partially from the sandstone earth that covers the reservation, this quiet retreat will provide two additional showers and toilets for students, as well as a warm, relaxing sauna and saltwater tub that will help students to ease their aching muscles after long, hard days of construction.