Fábrica de Cultura: BAQ

Culture is a vital part of urban life, however cultural facilities are often limited to affluent areas. Developed by U-TT in collaboration with an international network of partners, the Fábrica de Cultura: BAQ will provide a new space for teaching creative arts and traditions centered around Barranquilla‘s famous Carnival. Initiated by the municipality, the facility will extend access to cultural education, especially to residents of the impoverished Barrio Abajo.

The low-cost design, which utilizes local materials and processes of prefabrication, adopts open building principles to establish a framework that can be modified and reprogrammed by users over time. Working closely with engineers from the Universidad del Norte in Barranquilla, as well as experts in sustainable building technology from the SuAT Chair at ETH Zürich, the aim is to develop a flexible building prototype and construction system that can be replicated throughout the region.

The Fábrica de Cultura: BAQ project is sponsored by the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO), and coordinated by the Inter-American Development Bank as part of the Emerging and Sustainable Cities Initiative. In September 2016, the project was recognized with an International Architecture Award from the Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design.