Designer: Safira Lakhani, University of Waterloo, Ontario

Bamyan, in central Afghanistan, suffers from an extremely arid climate, causing it to rely heavily on foreign aid. Yet this impoverished town can take ownership over its land resources by storing more water from snow melt. This fundamental idea animates Safira Lakhani’s proposal, which centres on the implementation of light-timber frames throughout the land to capture snow melt and allow it to trickle down into new underground cisterns.
Along this snow fence route, Lakhani en-visions greenhouses and multi-generational homes that would honour the local vernacular – and make the community proud – by paying homage to traditional mud brick courtyards and cave typologies.