People need shelters to shield them from extremes of cold and heat, as well as from rain, snow, and wind. A shelter, man made or natural, is a place that covers, protects, and provides safety. Shelter/Housing is an element of civilization. Early hunter-gatherers who moved seasonally or followed herds relied on caves or rock shelters for their housing needs. Primitive tents of hide or wood fabric or wood shelters were also used by the nomadic hunter-gatherers.As a studio project, Shelter was conceived to be a three dimensional reference in an open space, to be built with local and inexpencive material. The students had to work hands-on in site and build the project themselves without any help from construction experts.

In the studio, the students, in groups, were given a task to design a shelter with locally available material. In the first phase, they worked in the studio, developed concept and design and carried out planning for construction. In the second phase, they realised the construction of final design in designated site.

The spirit of the studio ARC 102 is to capture the strength of 3d composition and creation of proportionate spaces. The final/terminal project had an added essence of space related to human need.  The main objective behind is to give the students an exposure to the complete process of designing and building such spaces in real scale. Since it’s a project of 1st level of architecture school – the scope of the project is limited to design and build something very basic, more of an installation. The end product was conceived to be a shelter for human to be built in a limited time frame. It was built with locally available material within a limited budget.

Contributed by : Shajjad Hossain | Senior Lecturer , BRAC University