Corobrik: latticed brick arch

Image courtesy of Luke Hayes

Presented with the Golden Lion award at the Venice Architecture Bienale 2016, Solano Benitez’s parabolic brick arch was an ingenious response to the scarcity an insecurity that the International Architecture Exhibition sought to address. Selected by the exhibition’s curator, Alejandro Aravena, the theme “Reporting From the Front” was used to guide Solano Benitez’s work of art. The architect’s parabolic brick arch makes use of two of the cheapest and most readily available resources found throughout the world: clay brick and unskilled labour. Benitez purposefully centred his construction around these resources in order to show how affordable materials and intensive labour could transform scarcity into abundance.

This approach to low-cost construction was an excellent interpretation of Aravena’s theme which aimed to address urgent issues facing the whole of humanity. The global need for rapid urban development was the focus of Benitez’s parabolic brick arch, and his design provided an apt solution for the far-reaching issue. “Urbanisation will require building at a pace, and with a scarcity of means never before seen in human history,” said Aravena, in response to Benitez’s design. He added. “If we don’t do so, people will not stop coming to cities; they will come anyhow, but will live in appalling conditions. So what can we do?”

As the low-cost construction demonstrates, there is much that can be done to combat the negative effects of urbanization. And the large, rugged and arching structure reveals how low-tech building techniques can be used to produce admirable urban architecture for those in need of affordable housing. The Venice Architecture Bienale Jury praised Benitez’s team for “harnessing simple materials, structural ingenuity and unskilled labour to bring architecture to underserved communities”. Contact: Corobrik