This design studio addressed both the technical and cultural issues that arise during the design, construction and re-imagining of an outdoor room for tropical locations. This outdoor room plays a pivotal place in the ‘glue’ that holds communities together – no matter whether the communities are from high or low socio-economic groupings – and is where people come together to share their stories, domestic tasks, food/drink……

These outdoor rooms are called bowers or salas in the case study locations investigated during the preliminary/research components of the studio (Northern Australia and Thailand). They are not elaborate structures (they are not built with the reverence associated with churches or temples) and are commonly built with reclaimed materials. However the simplicity of the structures commands respect for their cultural appropriateness and technical honesty.

During this studio we built a prototype full-scale bower/sala on the grounds of the university. Components were prefabricated in the workshop and the prototype erected on the university grounds. This prototype was then be refabricated a further four times – each refabrication tailored to suit various types of materials, client groupings etc. The main design component had the students designing a grouping of bowers/salas for an indigenous community in Darwin.