Children's sector of Phaplu hospital in Nepal by Ignacio Borrego Arquitectos

Description of the project by Ignacio Borrego Arquitectos

The Children´s Pavillion for the Phaplu  hospital in Nepal is conceived as a sustainable construction with six double rooms and a series of additional dependencies that allows the patients to combine the stay with additional rooms for children, indoor and outdoor but covered for the rainy season. 

The construction of this facility for this Nepalese population is not only an initiative to cover a need caused by the recent natural catastrophes and the economic context that the region suffers, but also an opportunity to investigate and show constructive systems that adapt local materials to the available labour and seismic stresses. It would be a success that the Children´s Pavillion became not only a space for medicalcare, but also a hybrid construction prototype (stone and bamboo) that serves as a reference to be reproduced on more occasions. 

The worst consequence of earthquakes is personal injuries, most of which are caused by the collapse of buildings. To avoid this, one possible solution is to raise robust monolithic structures to withstand tremors and accompany seismic shaking, or another option is to create light and flexible structures that are capable of absorbing movements without collapsing. Making the first type of structures with guarantees is a very expensive effort and it seems more appropriate to build a light and cheap typology. For this purpose it is proposed to produce the entire building up to a meter high with stone solving the foundation and the protection against the soil moisture. This part of the construction would not be a risk of collapse due to its low height, and even less to cause damage to its inhabitants. Above this level is proposed to make a bamboo structure, which is cheap and affordable for a non-skilled workforce.