About

About us

Our mission is to bring you a carefully curated selection of the best architecture, design, interiors projects and building products from Africa. Core to our mission is changing the African built environment for the better by providing inspiration, knowledge and developing online tools to help and inspire architects to do their jobs better and to distribute this across the Yakha community of architects, designers, researchers, manufacturers and retailers.

A building product isn’t something that exists in isolation. At Yakha, we believe that the relation between the building product, it’s regional context and the architectural space to which it’s applied is fundamental to a successful project. That’s why we’re working on linking AfriCAN architectural projects with the furnishings, materials and fittings that have been used in their execution, resulting in a completely new information resource for AfriCAN architects and planners, as well as for designers and manufacturers.

Projects

Women’s Opportunity Center | Sharon Davis Design

The Women’s Opportunity Center (WOC), designed in collaboration with Women for Women International, occupies a two-hectare site one hour from the Rwandan capital and has been developed with the following objectives in mind: to empower its community, create economic opportunity, and rebuild social infrastructure.

Commercial / Industrial / Public

French Embassy in Accra | Segond-Guyon Architectes

The project is located within the French Ambassador Residence in Ghana. This site is remarkable due to the architecture value of the Building, rare colonial architecture from the 50’s, and the quality of the 3ha Park’s landscape. The architectural language of the new Embassy finds its inspiration in the respect of these two major components of the site.

Community / Education / Public

Girl Move Academy | ROOTSTUDIO + Paz Braga

From September 2018 to April 2019 architect João Boto Caeiro and his team RootStudio with the collaboration of architect Paz Braga worked on the design and monitoring of execution of an academy to be used by a non-profit organization – Girl Move, leading a new education model by empowering women in vulnerable contexts.

Community / Education

Seed Library | Architects of Justice

The SEED library is intended as a repeatable prototype. It can only be wished that it would be repeated many times over, as there are simply too many sad and depressing places of learning in South Africa where buildings such as this could act as symbols of and contribute to, a materially better future.

Community / Public

Red Location | Noero Architects

Red Location was the first settled black township of Port Elizabeth. It derives its name from a series of corrugated iron barrack buildings, which are rusted a deep red colour. These were part of a Boer concentration camp in Uitenhage and moved in 1900 to Red Location, where the first urban lack families settled. It became a site of struggle during the years of Apartheid. Many prominent political and cultural leaders were either born or lived in Red Location.

Community / Education

NMMU B Ed Foundation Phase Building | The Matrix Urban Designers & Architects

The competition was won by the Matrix Architects & Urban Designers, whose scheme proposed a structurally playful building that reformed the previously fenced off connection with the local community through the creation of a public square. The inclusion of the building and greater campus into the surrounding context was one of the primary conceptual drivers.