Rammed earth for outdoor furniture

Last July, during workshop #2 of the LearnBIØN-program, AK0 together with local associations and the municipality of Casaprota have equipped a training location for sustainable architecture within an abandoned building in central Italy. Thanks to the initial spark coming from the Erasmus+ program, the spot is now turning more and more into an international hub to exchange innovative knowledge on how to build contemporary architecture in a sustainable way.

In this framework, from 7th till 11th of May, a group of students from the German University of Braunschweig have attended a workshop on “Building with Rammed Earth”. The students from Lower Saxony are attending a seminar on automation processes of raw earth construction. Before getting their hands on computers and robots in the research laboratories at home, their seminar teachers Johannes Oechsler and Federica Loccarini found it meaningful to provide an opportunity for some hands-on learning. Understanding the basic process and preparing later design options were about the main goals of the learning experience abroad.

For one week the participants got to knew about selection and preparation of earth samples, design and installation of formwork and ramming techniques. The team, assisted by workshop coordinator Stefan Pollak, built a fix furniture that acts as parapet and bench within the multi-purpose space in Casaprota. It is another little addition that contributes to turn the abandoned building into a place for the local community and helps changing perspective on some aspects of the local development.