2021 Research Prize
Soil Sisters: An Intersectoral Material Design Framework for Soil Health

“Soil Sisters: An Intersectoral Material Design Framework for Soil Health” brings together convergent research in agrowaste upcycling, phytoremediation systems, and circular material life cycle design at Yale’s Center for Ecosystems in Architecture (CEA) with circular textile companies Global Mamas in Ghana (partner since 2011) and Ecolibri in Guatemala (partner since 2004). By exploring soil restoration practices and their generation of diverse, derivative material practices as a springboard for materials research, this approach represents a proactive rather than reactive approach to soil health. Building on existing partnerships with uniquely innovative enterprises for forging transformational circular models for agrarian economies in Ghana (Global Mamas) and Guatemala (Ecolibri) and their intersectoral communities of practice, we will explore practices of healthy soil cultivation as a guiding framework for the codevelopment and evaluation of derivative sustainable material practices. This project will focus on designing architectural systems with the diverse material outputs of sister cropping farming practices in San Juan La Laguna, Guatemala as well as proka soil conservation practices across Ghana in order to generate and evaluate a broad range of material production logics, transformation pathways, and uses.

In Guatemala, as well as in Native American cultures, “three sisters” cropping practices have been studied widely as an effective method of enhancing nutrient-fixation and maintaining nutrient balances in soil. Not only do such soil conservation practices offer strategies for crop resilience in the face of climate change phenomena, they also propose material resource programming logics from a quantitative and qualitative perspective. Conversely, cyclical practices of layered mulching observed in traditional proka agriculture across Ghana offer important insights for spatializing and timing the degradation of materials at the end of their life cycles and accelerating plant regeneration. Considered together, the project will explore the nurturing and expanding of such multicrop value chains resulting in a class of “soil sister” products—ranging from food, bioadhesives, building materials, and building system typologies to textiles products. The research will seek to address core research questions:

• What new conceptual frameworks and guidelines for matching material composition to transformation processes can be developed to guide the development of “soil sister” products across sectors?
• How can integrated metrics for building material performance, and derivative prototypes, be developed in response to designing for soil health over time?
  
• How can the development knowledge economies for “soil sister” material practices make visible and propel new agency for alienated labor throughout the agricultural, design, manufacturing, distribution, and the consumer ecosystem?

Pedagogical Approach

The pedagogical approach aims to construct and rethink the format of exchange, cooperative development, and project evaluation for all stakeholders, moving away from colonial patterns of engagement within academic-community partnerships. This will be done on three levels:

1. Redesign of the architectural “crit” to broaden formats for knowledge exchange and evaluation for an interdisciplinary and community audience. Students will be challenged to embed and translate the architectural map, drawing, model, and multimedia in innovative ways to facilitate informed evaluation from this broadened audience.
2. Travel reciprocity between different stakeholders in the academic-community-research network. With the support of the SOM Foundation Research Prize, a curated list of material experts, agronomists, community farming practitioners, polymer scientists (for upcycling to bioadhesives), and design partners from Ghana and Guatemala will each be invited to design a seminar and biomaterials workshop at YSoA and Yale CEA. Secondly, during the studio’s travel to Guatemala during the Spring Recess, the immersion of students in Ecolibri’s context will include community-led soil-preparation practices right before the April planting season as well as through a range of textile, building material, and culinary exchanges.
3. Open-source dissemination of studio outputs and material research through the studio website, working symposia, publications, and traveling exhibition.

As part of a wider, integrated academic initiative to address global biodiversity and climate change across the institute, the project investigates the development of a class of “soil sister” materials and derivative practices predicated on biocompatible soil practices. Engaging agricultural and cultural patrimonies in both contexts, the broader goal is to evolve global models of architectural research to center generative justice as a driving framework for architectural and social innovation.

Project Partners

Global Mamas, Ghana
Global Mamas Fair Trade Zone is a circular manufacturing hub for just textile production in Akuse, 50 km from Ghana’s Lake Volta. Since 2003, Global Mamas has provided training, financial, and technical resources to women-led home-based enterprises (HBEs), providing them a platform for selling their products, receiving fixed incomes 1.75 times the national living wage and upskilling to compete with the global apparel market. Ninety percent of the revenue is generated by apparel sale and the profits are reinvested back as resources. Since its inception in 2003 as a cluster of a few women, it has grown into a network of more than two hundred-women led HBEs. As a model for ethical and sustainable apparel production, Global Mamas was granted World Fair Trade Organization (WFTO) membership, certifying that Global Mamas’ products meet environmental, social, and economic goals.

Ecolibri, Guatemala
Since its inception, Ecolibri has worked with Indigenous communities across the Lake Atitlán area in Guatemala to initiate and successfully deliver projects that integrate sustainable methods for farming that also support the local economy for the production of textiles and construction materials through upcycled agricultural waste. Unsustainable agricultural practices and improper waste management have greatly degraded the ecology, ecosystem, and once abundant natural resources of Lake Atitlán, eroding fertile soil and altering water quality. This in turn has impaired the ability of many families to provide high-quality nutrition and safe drinking water to their dependents, which has led to rampant emigration from the region.

“Soil Sisters: An Intersectoral Material Design Framework for Soil Health” is an exciting project at so many levels! Setting the premise that working around soil remediation and material life is integrally part of design briefs by integrating architectural design with scientific and engineering research is a necessary shift of perspective for the profession. To have a holistic approach beyond solely focusing on designing buildings is one that architecture schools must embrace urgently and setting precedents is key. The project is also suggesting a pivot regarding the ways that knowledge is transferred, evaluated, and communicated, which is also a revolutionary task ahead for our profession. Handing over mastery by integrating and listening to local groups, seeking help and advice from other fields and social strata beyond the ubiquitous center of knowledge production is so urgently needed to remediate damage, emancipate, and maintain design relevance. Open-source is also essential to this project, pointing at the urgency of sharing solutions—"Soil Sisters” know there is no time to lose.

Charlotte Malterre-Barthes, Juror