Category: Ghana

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Backyard Community Club: DeRoche Projects

 

Source: DailyArch

DeRoche Projects was founded in 2022 by Glen DeRoche after a decade-long stint at Adjaye Associates. After leaving Adjaye Associates and completing his M.Arch at The Bartlett School of Architecture, Glen relocated to Ghana where he began working with Jurgen Benson-Strohmayer. Now building his own practice, De Roche’s work places an emphasis on heritage, sustainable construction, and community. With a background in photography it comes as no surprise that his practice now works between Architecture and Art- with photography still being a large part of his creative process.

Source: Stir World
Source: Azure Magazine

Four- meter rammed earth walls surround the Backyard Community Club’s tennis court in Accra, Ghana. The Backyard Community Club meets a need for public space in, utilizing a site strategy that DeRoche Projects calls “deliberately open-ended, where lines between sport, gathering, learning, and rest are blurred.” The court is bordered on one side by a garden of edible and medicinal plants along with restrooms and changing rooms. The remaining sides are bordered by either concrete or rammed earth walls that meet the surrounding neighborhood. 2

Source: Julien Lanoo

This project is the first instance of precast rammed earth modules in Ghana. Each module was designed with a perforation and taper, this design creates triangular fenestrations across the whole wall. 3

Source: DailyArch

DeRoche’s use of rammed earth walls pulls from a long history of earth building in Ghana. Indigenous peoples in this area typically used wattle and daub as well as the Atakpame method- a way of building with earth creating monolithic earth walls that provided thermal mass to cool interiors. 4 DeRoche also has a personal connection to rammed earth walls, saying in an interview with PINUP, “I see texture as a way of deepening the sensorial qualities of architecture. It allows for depth, richness, and this poetic dance between light and shadow, which create emotive and surreal ways of making and experiencing space.” This is exemplified by the rammed earth modules in this project which cast deep shadows across the tennis court or garden depending on the time of day.

 

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Sources:

  1. Harvey-Ideozu, Angel. “An Architecture of One’s Own with Glenn DeRoche.” PIN–UP Magazine, PIN–UP Magazine, www.pinupmagazine.org/articles/glenn-deroche-interview
  2. Dezeen. “DeRoche Projects Encloses Accra Tennis Court with Rammed-Earth Walls.” Dezeen, 17 Nov. 2025, www.dezeen.com/2025/11/17/deroche-projects-backyard-community-club-accra/
  3. DeRoche Projects. DeRoche Projects, derocheprojects.com/.
  4. Souza, Eduardo. “Colors Of the Earth: Ghana’s Incredible, Rammed Earth Walls.” ArchDaily, 18 Nov. 2021, www.archdaily.com/914736/colors-of-the-earth-the-incredible-designs-of-rammed-earth-walls-in-ghana

 

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Anna Heringer: Earth Campus

The Earth Campus in Tatale, Ghana, is a vocational training center designed to promote sustainable development through education and practical skill-building in one of Ghana’s rural regions, close to the Togo border. The project focuses on providing young people with the skills needed to support their families and counteract rural exodus. It is operated by the Salesians with the Don Bosco mission, which aims to empower the local community through sustainable techniques and education.

 

The campus offers training in sustainable construction methods such as adobe masonry, rammed earth, and timber structures. It also includes programs in agriculture, electrical training, domestic economy, and nutrition, giving students a broad range of skills. The campus is designed to incorporate local building traditions while teaching modern adaptations of these methods, blending vernacular architecture with contemporary sustainable techniques.

Tatale Campus, GhanaTatale Campus, Ghana

The use of local, natural materials such as earth plays a crucial role in reducing environmental impact while creating economic opportunities for the community. The project also uses natural ventilation strategies, ensuring comfort in the hot and humid climate of the region. The overall goal is to make the campus a model for how development projects can foster both environmental sustainability and social empowerment by maximizing local resources.

Tatale Campus, Ghana

Through its design, the Earth Campus serves as an example of how architecture can be a tool for development. It challenges the conventional approach of using industrialized, imported materials in aid projects and demonstrates the benefits of building with locally available resources. This ensures that the added value remains within the community, fostering long-term sustainability and cultural preservation.

About the architect:

Anna Heringer is a renowned architect from Germany. She studied at the University of Art and Industrial Design Linz in Austria, focusing on sustainable architecture using local materials and techniques. Her work is rooted in creating environmentally and socially responsible architecture.

Heringer’s philosophy centers on sustainability and empowering communities through architecture. She emphasizes the use of natural, local materials, aiming to create socially and ecologically responsible structures. Her projects often focus on education, community development, and uplifting marginalized regions, particularly through vocational training and local engagement.

Anna Heringer runs her architectural practice, Studio Anna Heringer, with projects across the globe, including in Bangladesh, Ghana, and Europe. Her designs are grounded in cultural sensitivity and sustainable practices that challenge conventional construction norms.

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Inno-native Earthen Architecture

Joe Osae-Addo, a Ghanaian-born architect, living in Los Angeles was determined to build with the materials found primarily in rural areas of his native country: timber and mud brick. Because mud brick doesn’t exist in cities in Ghana, Addo had to build his own during the construction of his own home. He coined a phrase for his approach to contextual modern architecture: “inno-native.”