Architecture in Liberia

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The article Architecture in Liberia gives an overview of the past and present of architecture in Liberia , attached to buildings that shape the image of the capital Monrovia and numerous settlements and cities in Liberia and to outstanding builders , architects and engineers who worked or worked in Liberia Act.

Traditional architectural styles

The traditional construction of the indigenous population groups has adapted over centuries to the living conditions in the tropical rainforest and the savannah and consists of simple wooden huts covered with leaves or mud houses with a thatched roof in the savannahs. Ornamental forms vary from region to region - for example, carved beams, the furniture is often artistically decorated.

  • Settlement in the rainforest zone

  • Settlement in the savannah

  • Settlement with traditional round huts

  • Moshee in the savannah

Types of tropical rainforest

The “ridge roof house”, which dominates the rainforest region, is 4 to 5 meters long and has an interior space of around 20 square meters. The material required for building the house is obtained from the immediate vicinity of the settlement area and consists of vegetable building materials, for example woven mats, palm leaves, brushwood and straw as well as processed wood for the load-bearing post structures. The service life of the houses is limited because of the building materials used and requires frequent maintenance work. On the other hand, the relatively frequent change to a new settlement site in the rainforest is necessary because of the prevailing agricultural cultivation methods. The houses form line-shaped settlement strips along rivers or paths. The central meeting place of the village is located in the center of the village and, in addition to the house of the chief or village elder, also has the shared warehouses and storehouses as well as various special buildings (cult rooms).

Shapes of the savannah

The house architecture of the savannah region has taken over the cylindrical round house, which is mainly made of clay. The construction of these buildings is more complex and usually requires the help of the family clan or the village population. These houses have a diameter of three to five meters and a usable space of around 20 square meters. The central post in the center of the construction supports the roof structure, which typically consists of a conical rafter roof with thatched roofing. The living habits of the population result in a strong differentiation in building use. The settlements built in the savannahs are laid out as rounds, each extended family forms a building complex with living and sleeping huts and special buildings (quarantine hut, delivery hut, menstruation hut, funeral hut) as well as storage huts and stables. To protect against wild animals and thieves, this facility is secured with a fence surrounding all buildings, a thorn hedge or a mud wall. Depending on the size of the homestead, there is a plot of land around this homestead that is intensively used as a garden and field.

Special forms

The mosques erected by the Muslims and various palaces erected are special forms of architecture.

Architecture of the early days

The former slaves who immigrated to Africa did not want to adopt these traditional house forms and copied the architecture popular in the southern states of the USA. A small number of government and administrative buildings have survived from this period.

Settler house in Robertsport, Liberia, 1983

As early as 1900, as a result of the advancing missionary work, a lively construction of church buildings began. The tried and tested brick construction was preferred and the traditional construction method (neo-Romanesque and neo-Gothic architecture) was based. Only a few stone buildings were erected in the emerging cities and larger settlements, as wood was available in great variety and inexpensively.

A clear change in the style of European architecture - so-called "colonial style buildings" - took place after the First World War . Inexpensive industrial building materials - above all corrugated iron replaced the previous natural building materials and became a status symbol of modern building - today they are devalued and synonymous with the slum architecture of the townships.

One of the most remarkable buildings in the old town of Monrovia is the Masonic Temple - the house of the Liberian Masonic lodge , today a ruin inhabited by the homeless.

Modern architecture

Since the civil war, a large part of the population has lived in emergency shelters and corrugated iron huts.

In the early 1950s, a group of young colored architects, including Henry Clifford Boles from the southern United States, was given a teaching position at the newly founded University of Liberia in architecture and urban planning. In addition to the apprenticeship training for local architects, her task also included the planning of several model buildings that were viewed as American development aid: The Monrovia Elementary School (1954) and the Mines and Geology Office of Liberia (1955), also built in Monrovia, also corresponded to the American one Building standard. A variety of buildings of modernity emerged in the tenure of President William Tubman and William R. Tolbert junior .

Urbanization processes in Monrovia

A new district of Monrovia is emerging in the mangrove swamp

The urban area of ​​Monrovia is divided into the historic old town with the government and administrative buildings on Capitol Hill and Cape Mesurado. To the east, the neighborhoods of the affluent citizens join, Congo Town and Paynesville .

The island Bushrod Iceland is the industrial and economic center of the capital with the neighboring port facilities and numerous warehouses. The railway lines from the hinterland also end there.

In the 1960s, the Tubmann government tried to build social housing in the West Point district with the help of European and American architects. The National Housing Authority of Liberia was commissioned to build model houses in the district. The plan failed miserably because the population of the district saw no improvement in their quality of life in the terraced apartments designed on the drawing board. A study by the University of Kassel with the title “Squatters in Monrovia” shows solutions for combining traditional West African housing designs and Western housing technology.
As a result of the civil war, more than 10 refugee camps and camps for homeless people from the city were set up on the outskirts of Monrovia. The housing shortage, aggravated by the progressive population growth, is forcing many families to penetrate the previously uninhabited mangrove region. Illegal settlements emerge - so-called shanty towns , which are considered slums.

Architects and urban planners

  • Henry Clifford Boles - Lecturer in Architecture and Urbanism, designed the Administration Building for the Mining Authority and the Monrovia Elementary School
  • Winston Richards - numerous government buildings in Liberia, he was also responsible for the urban development of Monrovia in the 1970s

Structures in Liberia

Representative buildings

Government building

Presidential Palace in new splendor

Foreign aid organizations

  • the United Nation Building is the representative office and operations center of the UN aid organizations in Liberia
  • the UNMIL headquarters is the administration building of UNMIL in Liberia

Foreign embassies

  • the Swedish Embassy

Urban planning

  • the Yekepa miners and factory settlement
  • the Bong Town factory settlement
  • the factory settlement of the Firestone plantation
  • the university campus of Monrovia

Infrastructure structures

Churches and mosques

  • the Catholic Cathedral in Monrovia
  • the St Mary Catholic Church in Sanniquellie
  • the First United Methodist Church in Sanniquellie
  • the Baptist Church in Sanniquellie
  • the Providence Baptist Church in Monrovia
  • the mosque on Benson Street Monrovia
  • the mosque in the provincial capital Ganta

Cultural sites

Sports facilities

Monuments

literature

  • Werner Korte: Liberia. A bibliography (1988–1998) with special references to the civil war . In: Institute for African Studies (Ed.): University of Leipzig papers on Africa . Politics and economics series. tape 23 . Leipzig 1999, ISBN 3-932632-33-8 , pp. 76 (English).
  • Patricia Levy, Michael Spilling: Liberia . In: Cultures of the World . Marshall Cavendish Benchmark, New York 2010, ISBN 978-0-7614-3414-6 , pp. 140 .
  • JW Lugenbeel: The republic of Liberia: its geography, climate, soil and productions, with a history of its early settlements . GS Stockwell, New York 1868, p. 299 ( limited preview in Google Book search).

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ Posting agreement: The posting took place at the express request of Liberian President William S. Tubman to US President Harry S. Truman (Point Four Program) .
  2. ↑ Model farm: In the same way, Francis E. Griffin was sent to set up a model farm and various facilities .

swell

  1. ↑ Patricia Levy, Michael Spilling: Liberia . In: Cultures of the World . Marshall Cavendish Benchmark, New York 2010, ISBN 978-0-7614-3414-6 , pp. 140 .
  2. ↑ A view of a Liberian grass hut…. (1947). In: Getty Images, Inc. Internet portal. Retrieved November 4, 2010 . (Historical images from the TIME LIVE archive)
  3. ↑ a b c Annemarie Fiedermutz-Laun: The Africa Lexicon . Ed .: Jacob E. Mabe. Peter Hammer Verlag, Wuppertal 2001, ISBN 3-87294-885-7 , architecture, p. 55-60 .
  4. ^ Liberian village (1947). In: Getty Images, Inc. Internet portal. Retrieved November 4, 2010 . (Historical images from the HULTON archive)
  5. ↑ A bush house (1947). In: Getty Images, Inc. Internet portal. Retrieved November 4, 2010 . (Historical images from the HULTON archive)
  6. ^ Max Belcher, Svend E. Holsoe, Bernard L. Herman: A land and life remembered: Americo-Liberians folk architecture . Univ. of Georgia Press, Atlanta 1988, pp. XII, 176 (illustrated book).
  7. ^ Ashmun Street in Monrovia, Liberia, circa 1910. In: Getty Images, Inc. Internet portal. Accessed November 4, 2010 . (Historical images, Paul Popper Collection)
  8. ^ Dreck Spurlock Wilson: African American architects (1865–1945) . Biographical Dictionary. Routledge, New York 2004, ISBN 0-415-92959-8 , Henry Clifford Boles; Francis E. Griffin, S. XII, 176 .
  9. ↑ Lucius Burkhardt, Jochem Jourdan: Squatters in Monrovia, Liberia . In: Building + Living . Zurich 1976, p. 288-289 . Digitized