InsideOut School in Ghana Built with €12,000 and Community Labor

Architects Andrea Tabocchini and Francesca Vittorini led the construction of the InsideOut school in a remote Ghanaian village after wind destroyed the only existing school. With no electricity and a budget of €12,000, they organized a 60-day community workshop using traditional rammed earth techniques and local timber. The school features parallel staggered earth walls with wooden brise-soleil screens and a raised roof to admit sunlight, creating permeable boundaries. The project won The Plan Award, Rethinking the Future Sustainability Award, and Archi-World Academy Award, and was named one of the ten best school projects of 2017 by Designboom. Tabocchini stated that architecture must regain a primary social role by transforming constraints into opportunities. The work exemplifies Alejandro Aravena's call for inventiveness against scarcity.