In 2024, Egypt completed its 1,155km stretch of the Cairo–Cape Town Highway, a 10,228km‑long road connecting 10 African countries – Egypt, Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and South Africa.   The imaginary of ‘Cape to Cairo’ is not new. In 1874, editor of the Daily Telegraph Edwin Arnold proposed a plan to connect the African continent by rail, a project that came to be known as the Cape to Cairo Railway project. Cecil Rhodes expressed his support for the project, seeing it as a means to connect the various ‘possessions’ of the British Empire across Africa, facilitating the movement of troops and natural resources. This railway project was never completed, and in 1970 was overlaid by a very different attempt at connecting the Cape to Cairo, as part of the Trans‑African Highway network. This 56,683km‑long system of highways – some dating from the colonial era, some built as part of the 1970s project, and some only recently built – aimed to create lines of connection across the African continent, from north to south as well as east to west.  Here, postcolonial state power invested in ‘moving the continent’s people and economies from past to future’, as architectural historians Kenny Cupers and Prita Meier write in their 2020 essay ‘Infrastructure between Statehood and Selfhood: The Trans‑African Highway’. The highways were to be built with the support of Kenya’s president Jomo Kenyatta, Ghana’s president Kwame Nkrumah and Ghana’s director of social welfare Robert Gardiner, as well as the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). This project was part of a particular historical moment during which anticolonial ideas animated most of the African continent; alongside trade, this iteration of Cape to Cairo centred social and cultural connection between African peoples. But though largely socialist in ambition, the project nevertheless engaged modernist developmentalist logics that cemented capitalism.  Lead image: Over a century in the making, the final stretches of the Cairo–Cape Town Highway are being finished. Egypt completed the section within its borders last year and a section over the dry Merille River in Kenya was constructed in 2019. Credit: Allan Muturi / SOPA / ZUMA / Alamy. Above: The route from Cairo to Cape Town, outlined in red, belongs to the Trans‑African Highway network, which comprises nine routes, here in black The project failed to fully materialise at the time, but efforts to complete the Trans‑African Highway network have been revived in the last 20 years; large parts are now complete though some links remain unbuilt and many roads are unpaved or hazardous. The most recent attempts to realise this project coincide with a new continental free trade agreement, the agreement on African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), established in 2019, to increase trade within the continent. The contemporary manifestation of the Cairo–Cape Town Highway – also known as Trans‑African Highway (TAH) 4 – is marked by deepening neoliberal politics. Represented as an opportunity to boost trade and exports, connecting Egypt to African markets that the Egyptian government view as ‘untapped’, the project invokes notions of trade steeped in extraction, reflecting the neoliberal logic underpinning contemporary Egyptian governance; today, the country’s political project, led by Abdel Fattah El Sisi, is oriented towards Egyptian dominance and extraction in relation to the rest of the continent.  Through an allusion to markets ripe for extraction, this language brings to the fore historical forms of domination that have shaped the connections between Egypt and the rest of the continent; previous iterations of connection across the continent often reproduced forms of domination stretching from the north of the African continent to the south, including the Trans‑Saharan slave trade routes across Africa that ended in various North African and Middle Eastern territories. These networks, beginning in the 8th century and lasting until the 20th, produced racialised hierarchies across the continent, shaping North Africa into a comparably privileged space proximate to ‘Arabness’. This was a racialised division based on a civilisational narrative that saw Arabs as superior, but more importantly a political economic division resulting from the slave trade routes that produced huge profits for North Africa and the Middle East. In the contemporary moment, these racialised hierarchies are bound up in political economic dependency on the Arab Gulf states, who are themselves dependent on resource extraction, land grabbing and privatisation across the entire African continent.  ‘The Cairo–Cape Town Highway connects Egypt to African markets viewed as “untapped”, invoking notions steeped in extraction’ However, this imaginary conjured by the Cairo–Cape Town Highway is countered by a network of streets scattered across Africa that traces the web of Egyptian Pan‑African solidarity across the continent. In Lusaka in Zambia, you might find yourself on Nasser Road, as you might in Mwanza in Tanzania or Luanda in Angola. In Mombasa in Kenya, you might be driving down Abdel Nasser Road; in Kampala in Uganda, you might find yourself at Nasser Road University; and in Tunis in Tunisia, you might end up on Gamal Abdel Nasser Street. These street names are a reference to Gamal Abdel Nasser, Egypt’s first postcolonial leader and president between 1956 and 1970.  Read against the contemporary Cairo–Cape Town Highway, these place names signal a different form of connection that brings to life Egyptian Pan‑Africanism, when solidarity was the hegemonic force connecting the continent, coming up against the notion of a natural or timeless ‘great divide’ within Africa. From the memoirs of Egyptian officials who were posted around Africa as conduits of solidarity, to the broadcasts of Radio Cairo that were heard across the continent, to the various conferences attended by anticolonial movements and postcolonial states, Egypt’s orientation towards Pan‑Africanism, beginning in the early 20th century and lasting until the 1970s, was both material and ideological. Figures and movements forged webs of solidarity with their African comrades, imagining an Africa that was united through shared commitments to ending colonialism and capitalist extraction.  The route between Cape Town in South Africa and Cairo in Egypt has long occupied the colonial imaginary. In 1930, Margaret Belcher and Ellen Budgell made the journey, sponsored by car brand Morris and oil company Shell Credit: Fox Photos / Getty The pair made use of the road built by British colonisers in the 19th century, and which forms the basis for the current Cairo–Cape Town Highway. The road was preceded by the 1874 Cape to Cairo Railway project, which connected the colonies of the British Empire Credit: Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division This network of eponymous streets represents attempts to inscribe anticolonial power into the materiality of the city. Street‑naming practices are one way in which the past comes into the present, ‘weaving history into the geographic fabric of everyday life’, as geographer Derek Alderman wrote in his 2002 essay ‘Street Names as Memorial Arenas’. In this vein, the renaming of streets during decolonisation marked a practice of contesting the production of colonial space. In the newly postcolonial city, renaming was a way of ‘claiming the city back’, Alderman continues. While these changes may appear discursive, it is their embedding in material spaces, through signs and maps, that make the names come to life; place names become a part of the everyday through sharing addresses or giving directions. This quality makes them powerful; consciously or unconsciously, they form part of how the spaces of the city are navigated.  These are traces that were once part of a dominant historical narrative; yet when they are encountered in the present, during a different historical moment, they no longer act as expressions of power but instead conjure up a moment that has long passed. A street in Lusaka named after an Egyptian general made more sense 60 years ago than it does today, yet contextualising it recovers a marginalised history of Egyptian Pan‑Africanism.  Markers such as street names or monuments are simultaneously markers of anticolonial struggle as well as expressions of state power – part of an attempt, by political projects such as Nasser’s, to exert their own dominance over cities, towns and villages. That such traces are expressions of both anticolonial hopes and postcolonial state power produces a sense of tension within them. For instance, Nasser’s postcolonial project in Egypt was a contradictory one; it gave life to anticolonial hopes – for instance by breaking away from European capitalism and embracing anticolonial geopolitics – while crushing many parts of the left through repression, censorship and imprisonment. Traces of Nasser found today inscribe both anticolonial promises – those that came to life and those that did not – while reproducing postcolonial power that in most instances ended in dictatorship.  Recent efforts to complete the route build on those of the post‑independence era – work on a section north of Nairobi started in 1968 Credit: Associated Press / Alamy The Trans‑African Highway network was conceived in 1970 in the spirit of Pan‑Africanism At that time, the routes did not extend into South Africa, which was in the grip of apartheid. The Trans‑African Highway initiative was motivated by a desire to improve trade and centre cultural links across the continent – an ambition that was even celebrated on postage stamps There have been long‑standing debates about the erasure of the radical anticolonial spirit from the more conservative postcolonial states that emerged; the promises and hopes of anticolonialism, not least among them socialism and a world free of white supremacy, remain largely unrealised. Instead, by the 1970s neoliberalism emerged as a new hegemonic project. The contemporary instantiation of Cape to Cairo highlights just how pervasive neoliberal logics continue to be, despite multiple global financial crises and the 2011 Egyptian revolution demanding ‘bread, freedom, social justice’.  But the network of streets named after anticolonial figures and events across the world is testament to the immense power and promise of anticolonial revolution. Most of the 20th century was characterised by anticolonial struggle, decolonisation and postcolonial nation‑building, as nations across the global south gained independence from European empire and founded their own political projects. Anticolonial traces, present in street and place names, point to the possibility of solidarity as a means of reorienting colonial geographies. They are a reminder that there have been other imaginings of Cape to Cairo, and that things can be – and have been – otherwise. 2025-06-13 Kristina Rapacki Share

This edition of the Venice Biennale includes 65 national pavilions, 11 collateral events, and over 750 participants in the international exhibition curated by Italian architect and engineer Carlo Ratti. Entitled Intelligens: Natural Artificial Collective, its stated aim is to make Venice a ‘living laboratory’. But Ratti’s exhibition in the Arsenale has been hit by mixed reviews. The AJ’s Rob Wilson described it as ‘a bit of a confusing mess’, while other media outlets have called the robot-heavy exhibit of future-facing building-focused solutions to the climate crisis a ‘tech-bro fever dream’ and a ‘mind-boggling rollercoaster’ to mention a few. It is a distinct shift away from the biennale of two years ago twhen Ghanaian-Scottish architect Lesley Lokko curated the main exhibitions, including 89 participants – of which more than half were from Africa or the African diaspora – in a convincing reset of the architectural conversation.Advertisement This year’s National Pavilions and collateral exhibits, by contrast, have tackled the largest themes in architecture and the world right now in a less constrained way than the main exhibitions. The exhibits are radical and work as a useful gauge for understanding what’s important in each country: decarbonisation, climate resilience, the reconstruction of Gaza, and an issue more prevalent in politics closer to home: gender wars. What's not to miss in the Giardini? British Pavilion (photography: Chris Lane) UK Pavilion The British Pavilion this year, which won a special mention from the Venetian jury, is housing a show by a British-Kenyan collab titled GBR – Geology of Britannic Repair. In it, the curators explore the links between colonialism, the built environment and geological extraction. Focusing on the Rift Valley, which runs from east Africa to the Middle East, including Palestine, the exhibition was curated by the Nairobi-based studio cave_bureau, UK-based curator, writer and Farrell Centre director Owen Hopkins and Queen Mary University professor Kathryn Yusoff. The pavilion’s façade is cloaked by a beaded veil of agricultural waste briquettes and clay and glass beads, produced in Kenya and India, echoing both Maasai practices and beads once made on Venice’s Murano, as currency for the exchange of metals, minerals and slaves. The pavilion’s six gallery spaces include multisensory installations such as the Earth Compass, a series of celestial maps connecting London and Nairobi; the Rift Room, tracing one of humans’ earliest migration routes; and the Shimoni Slave Cave, featuring a large-scale bronze cast of a valley cave historically used as a holding pen for enslaved people.Advertisement The show also includes Objects of Repair, a project by design-led research group Palestine Regeneration Team (PART), looking at how salvaged materials could help rebuild war-torn Gaza, the only exhibit anywhere in the Biennale that tackled the reconstruction of Gaza face-on – doing so impressively, both politically and sensitively. Read more here. Danish Pavilion (photography: Hampus Berndtson) Demark Pavilion A firm favourite by most this year, the Danish exhibition Build of Site, curated by Søren Pihlmann of Pihlmann Architects, transforms the pavilion, which requires renovation anyway, into both a renovation site and archive of materials. Clever, simple and very methodical, the building is being both renewed while at the same time showcasing innovative methods to reuse surplus materials uncovered during the construction process – as an alternative to using new resources to build a temporary exhibition. The renovation of the 1950s Peter Koch-designed section of the pavilion began in December 2024 and will be completed following the biennale, having been suspended for its duration. On display are archetypal elements including podiums, ramps, benches and tables – all constructed from the surplus materials unearthed during the renovation, such as wood, limestone, concrete, stone, sand, silt and clay. Belgian Pavilion (photography: Michiel De Cleene) Belgium Pavilion If you need a relaxing break from the intensity of the biennale, then the oldest national pavilion in the Giardini is the one for you. Belgium’s Building Biospheres: A New Alliance between Nature and Architecture brings ‘plant intelligence’ to the fore. Commissioned by the Flanders Architecture Institute and curated by landscape architect Bas Smets and neurobiologist Stefano Mancuso, the exhibit investigates how the natural ‘intelligence’ of plants can be used to produce an indoor climate – elevating the role of landscape design and calling for it to no longer serve as a backdrop for architecture. Inside, more than 200 plants occupy the central area beneath the skylight, becoming the pavilion’s centrepiece, with the rear space visualising ‘real-time’ data on the prototype’s climate control performance. Spanish Pavilion (photography: Luca Capuano) Spain Pavilion One for the pure architecture lovers out there, models (32!), installations, photographs and timber structures fill the Spanish Pavilion in abundance. Neatly curated by architects Roi Salgueiro Barrio and Manuel Bouzas Barcala, Internalities shows a series of existing and research projects that have contributed to decarbonising construction in Spain. The outcome? An extensive collection of work exploring the use of very local and very specific regenerative and low-carbon construction and materials – including stone, wood and soil. The joy of this pavilion comes from the 16 beautiful timber frames constructed from wood from communal forests in Galicia. Polish Pavilion (photography: Luca Capuano) Poland Pavilion Poland’s pavilion was like Marmite this year. Some loved its playful approach while others found it silly. Lares and Penates, taking its name from ancient Roman deities of protection, has been curated by Aleksandra Kędziorek and looks at what it means and takes to have a sense of security in architecture. Speaking to many different anxieties, it refers to the unspoken assumption of treating architecture as a safe haven against the elements, catastrophes and wars – showcasing and elevating the mundane solutions and signage derived from building, fire and health regulations. The highlight? An ornate niche decorated with tiles and stones just for … a fire extinguisher. Dutch Pavilion (photography: Cristiano Corte) Netherlands Pavilion Punchy and straight to the point, SIDELINED: A Space to Rethink Togetherness takes sports as a lens for looking at how spatial design can both reveal and disrupt the often-exclusionary dynamics of everyday environments. Within the pavilion, the exhibit looks beyond the large-scale arena of the stadium and gymnasium to investigate the more localised and intimate context of the sports bar, as well as three alternative sports – a site of both social production and identity formation – as a metaphor for uniting diverse communities. The pavilion-turned-sports bar, designed by Koos Breen and Jeannette Slütter and inspired by Asger Jorn’s three-sided sports field, is a space for fluidity and experimentation where binary oppositions, social hierarchies and cultural values are contested and reshaped – complete with jerseys and football scarfs (currently a must-have fashion item) worn by players in the alternative Anonymous Allyship aligning the walls. Read Derin Fadina’s review for the AJ here. Performance inside the Nordic Countries Pavilion (photography: Venla Helenius) Nordic Countries Pavilion Probably the most impactful national pavilion this year (and with the best tote bag by far), the Nordic Countries have presented an installation with performance work. Curated by Kaisa Karvinen, Industry Muscle: Five Scores for Architecture continues Finnish artist Teo Ala-Ruona’s work on trans embodiment and ecology by considering the trans body as a lens through which to examine modern architecture and the built environment. The three-day exhibition opening featured a two-hour performance each day with Ala-Ruona and his troupe crawling, climbing and writhing around the space, creating a bodily dialogue with the installations and pavilion building itself, which was designed by celebrated Modernist architect Sverre Fehn. The American pavilion next door, loudly (country music!) turns its back on what’s going on in its own country by just celebrating the apathetical porch, making the Nordic Countries seem even more relevant in this crucial time. Read Derin Fadina’s review for the AJ here. German Pavilion (photography: Luca Capuano) Germany Pavilion An exhibit certainly grabbing the issue of climate change by its neck is the German contribution, Stresstest. Curated by Nicola Borgmann, Elisabeth Endres, Gabriele G Kiefer and Daniele Santucci, the pavilion has turned climate change into a literal physical and psychological experience for visitors by creating contrasting ‘stress’ and ‘de-stress’ rooms. In the dark stress room, a large metal sculpture creates a cramped and hot space using heating mats hung from the ceiling and powered by PVs. Opposite is a calmer space demonstrating strategies that could be used to reduce the heat of cities, and between the two spaces is a film focusing on the impacts of cities becoming hotter. If this doesn’t highlight the urgency of the situation, I’m not sure what will. Best bits of the Arsenale outside the main exhibitions Bahrain Pavilion (photography: Andrea Avezzù) Bahrain Pavilion Overall winner of this year’s Golden Lion for best national participation, Bahrain’s pavilion in the historic Artiglierie of the Arsenale is a proposal for living and working through heat conditions. Heatwave, curated by architect Andrea Faraguna, reimagines public space design by exploring passive cooling strategies rooted in the Arab country’s climate, as well as cultural context. A geothermal well and solar chimney are connected through a thermo-hygrometric axis that links underground conditions with the air outside. The inhabitable space that hosts visitors is thus compressed and defined by its earth-covered floor and suspended ceiling, and is surrounded by memorable sandbags, highlighting its scalability for particularly hot construction sites in the Gulf where a huge amount of construction is taking place. In the Arsenale’s exhibition space, where excavation wasn’t feasible, this system has been adapted into mechanical ventilation, bringing in air from the canal side and channelling it through ductwork to create a microclimate. Slovenian Pavilion (photography: Andrea Avezzù) Slovenia Pavilion The AJ’s Rob Wilson’s top pavilion tip this year provides an enjoyable take on the theme of the main exhibition, highlighting how the tacit knowledge and on-site techniques and skills of construction workers and craftspeople are still the key constituent in architectural production despite all the heat and light about robotics, prefabrication, artificial intelligence and 3D printing. Master Builders, curated by Ana Kosi and Ognen Arsov and organised by the Museum of Architecture and Design (MAO) in Ljubljana, presents a series of ‘totems’ –accumulative sculpture-like structures that are formed of conglomerations of differently worked materials, finishes and building elements. These are stacked up into crazy tower forms, which showcase various on-site construction skills and techniques, their construction documented in accompanying films. Uzbekistan Pavilion (photography: Luca Capuano) Uzbekistan Pavilion Uzbekistan’s contribution explores the Soviet era solar furnace and Modernist legacy. Architecture studio GRACE, led by curators Ekaterina Golovatyuk and Giacomo Cantoni have curated A Matter of Radiance. The focus is the Sun Institute of Material Science – originally known as the Sun Heliocomplex – an incredible large-scale scientific structure built in 1987 on a natural, seismic-free foundation near Tashkent and one of only two that study material behaviour under extreme temperatures. The exhibition examines the solar oven’s site’s historical and contemporary significance while reflecting on its scientific legacy and influence moving beyond just national borders. Applied Arts Pavilion (photography: Andrea Avezzù) V&A Applied Arts Pavilion Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R) is having a moment. The US-based practice, in collaboration with V&A chief curator Brendan Cormier, has curated On Storage, which aptly explores global storage architectures in a pavilion that strongly links to the V&A’s recent opening of Storehouse, its new (and free) collections archive in east London. Featured is a six-channel (and screen) film entitled Boxed: The Mild Boredom of Order, directed by the practice itself and following a toothbrush, as a metaphor for an everyday consumer product, on its journey through different forms of storage across the globe – from warehouse to distribution centre to baggage handlers down to the compact space of a suitcase. Also on display are large-format photographs of V&A East Storehouse, DS+R’s original architectural model and sketchbook and behind-the-scenes photography of Storehouse at work, taken by emerging east London-based photographers. Canal Café (photography: Marco Zorzanello) Canal café Golden Lion for the best participation in the actual exhibition went to Canal Café, an intervention designed by V&A East Storehouse’s architect DS+R with Natural Systems Utilities, SODAI, Aaron Betsky and Davide Oldani. Serving up canal-water espresso, the installation is a demonstration of how Venice itself can be a laboratory to understand how to live on the water in a time of water scarcity. The structure, located on the edge of the Arsenale’s building complex, draws water from its lagoon before filtering it onsite via a hybrid of natural and artificial methods, including a mini wetland with grasses. The project was recognised for its persistence, having started almost 20 years ago, just showing how water scarcity, contamination and flooding are still major concerns both globally and, more locally, in the tourist-heavy city of Venice. And what else? Holy See Pavilion (photography: Andrea Avezzù) The Holy See Much like the Danish Pavilion, the Pavilion of the Holy See is also taking on an approach of renewal this year. Over the next six months, Opera Aperta will breathe new life into the Santa Maria Ausiliatrice Complex in the Castello district of Venice. Founded as a hospice for pilgrims in 1171, the building later became the oldest hospital and was converted into school in the 18th century. In 2001, the City of Venice allocated it for cultural use and for the next four years it will be managed by the Dicastery for Culture and Education of the Holy See to oversee its restoration. Curated by architect, curator and researcher Marina Otero Verzier and artistic director of Fondaco Italia, Giovanna Zabotti, the complex has been turned into a constant ‘living laboratory’ of collective repair – and received a special mention in the biennale awards. The restoration works, open from Tuesday to Friday, are being carried out by local artisans and specialised restorers with expertise in recovering stone, marble, terracotta, mural and canvas painting, stucco, wood and metal artworks. The beauty, however, lies in the photogenic fabrics, lit by a warm yellow glow, hanging from the walls within, gently wrapping the building’s surfaces, leaving openings that allow movement and offer glimpses of the ongoing restoration. Mobile scaffolding, used to support the works, also doubles up as furniture, providing space for equipment and subdividing the interior. Togo Pavilion (photography: Andrea Avezzù) Togo Pavilion The Republic of Togo has presented its first pavilion ever at the biennale this year with the project Considering Togo’s Architectural Heritage, which sits intriguingly at the back of a second-hand furniture shop. The inaugural pavilion is curated by Lomé and Berlin-based Studio NEiDA and is in Venice’s Squero Castello. Exploring Togo’s architectural narratives from the early 20th century, and key ongoing restoration efforts, it documents key examples of the west African country’s heritage, highlighting both traditional and more modern building techniques – from Nôk cave dwellings to Afro-Brazilian architecture developed by freed slaves to post-independence Modernist buildings. Some buildings showcased are in disrepair, despite most of the modern structures remaining in use today, including Hotel de la Paix and the Bourse du Travail, suggestive of a future of repair and celebration. Estonian Pavilion (photography: Joosep Kivimäe) Estonia Pavilion Another firm favourite this year is the Estonian exhibition on Riva dei Sette Martiri on the waterfront between Corso Garibaldi and the Giardini.  The Guardian’s Olly Wainwright said that outside the Giardini, it packed ‘the most powerful punch of all.’ Simple and effective, Let Me Warm You, curated by trio of architects Keiti Lige, Elina Liiva and Helena Männa, asks whether current insulation-driven renovations are merely a ‘checkbox’ to meet European energy targets or ‘a real chance’ to enhance the spatial and social quality of mass housing. The façade of the historic Venetian palazzetto in which it is housed is clad with fibre-cement insulation panels in the same process used in Estonia itself for its mass housing – a powerful visual statement showcasing a problematic disregard for the character and potential of typical habitable spaces. Inside, the ground floor is wrapped in plastic and exhibits how the dynamics between different stakeholders influence spatial solutions, including named stickers to encourage discussion among your peers. Venice Procuratie (photography: Mike Merkenschlager) SMAC (San Marco Art Centre) Timed to open to the public at the same time as the biennale, SMAC is a new permanent arts institution in Piazza San Marco, on the second floor of the Procuratie, which is owned by Generali. The exhibition space, open to the public for the first time in 500 years, comprises 16 galleries arranged along a continuous corridor stretching over 80m, recently restored by David Chipperfield Architects. Visitors can expect access through a private courtyard leading on to a monumental staircase and experience a typically sensitive Chipperfield restoration, which has revived the building’s original details: walls covered in a light grey Venetian marmorino made from crushed marble and floors of white terrazzo. During the summer, its inaugural programme features two solo exhibitions dedicated to Australian modern architect Harry Seidler and Korean landscape designer Jung Youngsun. Holcim's installation (photography: Celestia Studio) Holcim x Elemental Concrete manufacturer Holcim makes an appearance for a third time at Venice, this time partnering with Chilean Pritzker Prize-winning Alejandro Aravena’s practice Elemental – curator of the 2016 biennale – to launch a resilient housing prototype that follows on from the Norman Foster-designed Essential Homes Project. The ‘carbon-neutral’ structure incorporates Holcim’s range of low-carbon concrete ECOPact and is on display as part of the Time Space Existence exhibition organised by the European Cultural Centre in their gardens. It also applies Holcim’s ‘biochar’ technology for the first time, a concrete mix with 100 per cent recycled aggregates, in a full-scale Basic Services Unit. This follows an incremental design approach, which could entail fast and efficient construction via the provision of only essential housing components, and via self-build. The Next Earth at Palazzo Diedo (photography: Joan Porcel) The Next Earth At Palazzo Diedo’s incredible dedicated Berggruen Arts and Culture space, MIT’s department of architecture and think tank Antikythera (apparently taking its name from the first-known computer) have come together to create the exhibition The Next Earth: Computation, Crisis, Cosmology, which questions how philosophy and architecture must and can respond to various planet-wide crises. Antikythera’s The Noocene: Computation and Cosmology from Antikythera to AI looks at the evolution of ‘planetary computation’ as an ‘accidental’ megastructure through which systems, from the molecular to atmospheric scales, become both comprehensible and composable. What is actually on display is an architectural scale video monolith and short films on AI, astronomy and artificial life, as well as selected artefacts. MIT’s Climate Work: Un/Worlding the Planet features 37 works-in-progress, each looking at material supply chains, energy expenditure, modes of practice and deep-time perspectives. Take from it what you will. The 19th International Venice Architecture Biennale remains open until Sunday, 23 November 2025.

Technology  Rate this post Africa is a large and beautiful continent. It has many countries, cultures, and people. Each country is unique. Some are small, while others are very large. In this article, we will explore how many countries are in Africa. We will also learn some interesting facts about them. How Many Countries Are in Africa in 2025? As of 2025, Africa has 54 recognized countries. These countries are members of the African Union (AU). Some sources may list 55 or 56. That is because of disputed territories. However, the official number is 54 countries. What Are These Countries? Here is a list of all 54 African countries: Algeria Angola Benin Botswana Burkina Faso Burundi Cape Verde (Cabo Verde) Cameroon Central African Republic Chad Comoros Democratic Republic of the Congo Republic of the Congo Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) Djibouti Egypt Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) Ethiopia Gabon Gambia Ghana Guinea Guinea-Bissau Kenya Lesotho Liberia Libya Madagascar Malawi Mali Mauritania Mauritius Morocco Mozambique Namibia Niger Nigeria Rwanda Sao Tome and Principe Senegal Seychelles Sierra Leone Somalia South Africa South Sudan Sudan Tanzania Togo Tunisia Uganda Zambia Zimbabwe Are There Any Disputed Regions? Yes, there are. Some regions are not fully recognized. The most well-known is Western Sahara. It wants independence. Some countries support it. Others do not. It is a disputed region. That’s why numbers may vary across sources. What Is the African Union? The African Union (AU) is like a family of African countries. It helps them work together. The AU has 55 members. This includes Western Sahara. That is why some people count 55 countries. But the United Nations recognizes 54 countries in Africa. How Is Africa Divided Geographically? Africa is usually divided into five regions: North Africa – Includes Egypt, Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Sudan. West Africa – Includes Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal, and many more. Central Africa – Includes Cameroon, Chad, and Congo. East Africa – Includes Kenya, Ethiopia, and Tanzania. Southern Africa – Includes South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Botswana. These regions are based on geography and culture. Each region has its languages and traditions. Which Is the Largest Country in Africa? Algeria is the largest country by land area. It is in North Africa. It covers over 2.3 million square kilometers. Which Is the Smallest Country in Africa? Seychelles is the smallest African country. It is a group of islands. It is located in the Indian Ocean. It has a population of less than 100,000 people. What Is the Most Populated Country in Africa? Nigeria has the most people in Africa. It has over 223 million people in 2025. That is a huge number. Nigeria is also a strong economy in the continent. Which Country Is the Youngest? South Sudan is the newest African country. It became independent in 2011. It was part of Sudan before. How Many Languages Are Spoken in Africa? Africa is full of languages. Over 2,000 languages are spoken across the continent. Some countries have more than 100 languages. What Are the Most Spoken Languages? Some common languages in Africa include: Arabic (mainly in North Africa) Swahili (East Africa) Hausa (West Africa) Amharic (Ethiopia) English and French (used in many countries) These languages help people from different tribes talk to each other. What Religions Are Practiced in Africa? Africa has many religions. The most common are: Islam – followed mostly in North and West Africa Christianity – followed in most parts of Sub-Saharan Africa Traditional African Religions – still practiced in rural areas Religion plays an important role in African life. What Makes Africa Special? Africa is the second-largest continent. It is rich in culture, wildlife, and history. It has deserts, rainforests, and savannas. Africa is home to the Sahara Desert, the Nile River, and Mount Kilimanjaro. Is Africa Growing Fast? Yes, very fast. Africa has one of the youngest populations in the world. Many people are under 25. Cities are growing. Technology is spreading. New businesses are starting. Africa is changing quickly. Top Cities in Africa Some of the largest and busiest cities are: Lagos (Nigeria) Cairo (Egypt) Johannesburg (South Africa) Nairobi (Kenya) Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) These cities are centers of business, culture, and government. Tourism in Africa Africa has many tourist spots. People visit for safaris, beaches, and ancient places. Some famous places include: Pyramids of Egypt Serengeti National Park Victoria Falls Table Mountain Sahara Desert Tourism is growing fast in many African countries. Conclusion Africa is a vibrant and powerful continent. It has 54 unique and independent countries. Each one adds value to the continent. From deserts to cities, from languages to religions, Africa has it all. Knowing how many countries are in Africa helps us understand its diversity. Africa will continue to grow in 2025 and beyond. Tech World TimesTech World Times (TWT), a global collective focusing on the latest tech news and trends in blockchain, Fintech, Development & Testing, AI and Startups. If you are looking for the guest post then contact at techworldtimes@gmail.com

Designing for the British Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale is never simply about surface-level graphics. For TEMPLO, now in its third year collaborating with the British Council on the project, it's become an exercise in turning complex political, historical, and geological themes into a rich, resonant visual language. This year's exhibition – GBR – Geology of Britannic Repair –is no exception. Curated by Jayden Ali, Meneesha Kellay, Victoria Broackes, and Rashid Ali, and with architecture by Nairobi-based cave_bureau, the 2025 Pavilion delves into ideas of extractivism, colonial legacies, and geopolitical fragmentation. It casts architecture not just as a practice of form but of land and memory (what the curators describe as an "earth practice"). TEMPLO's response is a brand identity that mirrors these themes in every detail, from tectonic type to movement-led visuals. It's an approach built not around a traditional logo-first mindset but through what managing director Anoushka Rodda calls a "graphic toolbox". It's flexible enough to span everything from wayfinding signage and social media posts to films, merchandise, and even sound. "Over our three years of working with the British Council in Venice, we've developed a deeply collaborative and interpretative approach," says Anoushka. "That requires a very close working relationship, which we built with an initial workshop and then regular catch-ups with the curatorial team." The result is an identity that doesn't shy away from complexity but embraces it. At its core is the symbolism of the Rift Valley, one of the most significant geological formations on Earth and a site rich with colonial, ecological, and geopolitical resonance. "Given the exhibition's thematic anchor in the Rift Valley, we had to develop an engaging and accessible visual system that could communicate multi-faceted and complex ideas, which could be all too easy to caricature," says co-founder and creative director Pali Palavathanan. The Rift Valley offered both metaphorical weight and formal inspiration for the project. Typography, in particular, was key, and the team began with a sharp, authoritative serif, which is a deliberate nod to imperial structures and colonial architecture. Through a process of carefully chipping away, serifs were softened, and corners were bevelled. The result is a custom treatment that feels weathered, precise and grounded. This softened, fragmented type treatment takes cues directly from the Pavilion's architecture. The British Pavilion's façade, typically defined by its neoclassical columns, has been veiled in a beaded skin by cave_bureau, crafted from agricultural waste, clay from Kenya and India, and shards of red glass. Inspired by Maasai manyatta dwellings, the veil transforms the building's tone from dominant to open, echoing the Pavilion's thematic commitment to repair and transformation. "We wanted to reflect this effect in the identity," says Pali. "So we chose a sharp-edged, authoritative typeface that conveys an impression of imperiousness – colonial authority, almost – which we then 'softened' by bevelling the edges, trimming the serifs and corners to create something more organic, earthy and geographic." Colour also plays a quiet but powerful role. Rather than using overt national or cultural motifs, TEMPLO wove in subtle references to Kenya, an intentional move given that the British Pavilion is part of the British Council's Year of Kenya season. Earthy tones inspired by the Kenyan flag lend the identity warmth and weight without leaning on cliché or pastiche. Movement truly brings the identity to life through type that fractures, shifts, pulls apart and converges. These tectonic actions are present both literally and symbolically, animated in digital formats and implied through dimensional perspective in static applications. "Movement was something that emerged organically early in the process," says Pali. "It soon became clear that movement is integral to the concept of architecture as earth practice, to the tectonic actions of the earth in forming the Rift Valley – the shifting of tectonic plates, the pulling apart and coming together – and to the extractive actions of humans upon the land." The effect is one of tension and possibility: a visual system always on the brink of something, whether it's collapse, repair, destruction, or reformation. That energy carries through all aspects of the campaign, from animated posters and online videos to physical lanyards and in-situ signage. "We are creating a digital campaign of film, audio and social media content for the world to experience, which to us is just as important as the experience in Venice," says Anoushka. Ensuring that cohesion across such a broad spectrum of media is no small task, but for TEMPLO, the answer was to resist the temptation of leading with a static mark. "If you start with a logo and treat everything else as secondary, it's easy to end up with something incoherent or introduce weaker visual elements," Anoushka continues. "But by transforming thematic ideas into a graphic toolbox that can be used to create brand elements of every kind – whether that's the logo, a piece of exhibition signage, a lanyard, or a piece of digital film – the identity becomes expansive, not restrictive." As with much of TEMPLO's work, the personal undercurrents are strong. The agency has long engaged with issues of climate justice, cultural restitution, and postcolonial narratives, but this year's Pavilion feels especially aligned. "Climate change and colonialism are at the heart of what we do," says Pali. "The curators' interests map perfectly onto our own values and personal stories. The Rift Valley begins in Lebanon, where Anoushka has roots, and my family came to the UK from a village in Sri Lanka that was used as a source for extraction." That emotional connection added extra weight to the Pavilion's opening, where the curators dedicated the space to colonised peoples (past and present) from Kenya to Palestine. For TEMPLO, it affirmed the value of design that moves beyond visual language into something more civic, ethical, and effective. "The British Pavilion is always about much more than architecture; it provides a platform for unheard voices and alternative perspectives," says Anoushka. "That's what drives us as an agency to continue to want to collaborate with the British Council – there's a consistent bravery to what they do." In Geology of Britannic Repair, that bravery takes shape through topography and typography, fracture and form, a quietly radical reimagining of what national representation at Venice can be. For TEMPLO, it's not about spectacle. It's about systems that move – across media, meanings, and geographies – with care, clarity, and conscience.

html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd" The British Pavilion, which was awarded a Special Mention for National Participation at the 19th International Architecture Exhibition, is presenting GBR – Geology of Britannic Repair at the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale.The Rift Valley is a geological feature that extends from southeast Africa via Mozambique, Kenya, and Ethiopia, along the Red Sea, through Jordan, Palestine, Israel, and Lebanon, to southern Turkey, is the geographical, geological, and conceptual focal point of the show.Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff, Double Vision. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025The exhibition is curated by a multidisciplinary team of curators, including Kabage Karanja and Stella Mutegi of the Nairobi-based architecture studio Cave_bureau, UK-based curator and writer Owen Hopkins, and academic Professor Kathryn Yusoff, collaborated on the show. A variety of international practitioners, such as Mae-ling Lokko and Gustavo Crembil, Thandi Loewenson, and the Palestine Regeneration Team / PART - Yara Sharif, Nasser Golzari, and Murray Fraser, have commissioned installations in addition to the curatorial team's creations.Entrance to the British Pavilion. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025"A dialogue between Great Britain and Kenya about reparation and renewal" earned the British Pavilion a Special Mention from the jury. The Pavilion displays an extraction-defined architecture that leads to degradation of the environment and inequity. The Venice Fellowships Programme is a noteworthy project for knowledge exchange between Venice, Great Britain, and Kenya. The jury also highlights attempts to envision a new relationship between architecture and geology.Room 2: “Rift Room,” Cave_bureau, Owen Hokins and Kathryn Yusoff. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025"We are hugely honoured that GBR – Geology of Britannic Repair has been recognised by the jury. The exhibition creates a vital space for dialogue and collaboration between our two countries that builds on their difficult, traumatic and deeply unbalanced past relationship, to imagine different possible futures," said curators Kabage Karanja, Stella Mutegi, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff. "Architecture has a unique capacity to further repair, renewal and restitution and we are delighted that this message has so resonated for the jury. We have already been overwhelmed by the visitor response to the exhibition, and we hope it will continue to challenge and inspire those who visit over the coming months," the curators added.Room 2: “Rift Room,” Cave_bureau, Owen Hokins and Kathryn Yusoff. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025"The British Council, the curators and I are honoured to be awarded a Special Mention by the jury of the 19th International Architecture Exhibition and we would like to extend our thanks to the jury and La Biennale di Venezia," Sevra Davis, Director of Architecture Design and Fashion at the British Council and Commissioner of the British Pavilion."GBR – Geology of Britannic Repair confronts difficult conversations of the role played by architecture in extractive relations while also creating opportunities for hope, optimism and joy.""I am immensely proud of the curators and our partners for their work on this historic collaboration between the UK and Kenya which celebrates connection between the two countries - in line with our mission of building understanding and trust between people in the UK and countries worldwide," Davis added.Room 5: “Lumumba’s Grave,” Dr Thandi Loewenson. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff, Double Vision (detail). Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 5: “Lumumba’s Grave,” Dr Thandi Loewenson. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 2: “Rift Room,” Cave_bureau, Owen Hokins and Kathryn Yusoff. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 5: “Lumumba’s Grave,” Dr Thandi Loewenson. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 1: “Earth Compass,” Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff, Double Vision (detail). Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff, Double Vision (detail). Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 3: “Objects of repair” - Palestine Regeneration Team/PART (Yara Sharif, Nasser Golzari, Murray Fraser). Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 3: “Objects of repair” - Palestine Regeneration Team/PART (Yara Sharif, Nasser Golzari, Murray Fraser). Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 6: “Vena Cava,” Mae Ling Lokko and Gustavo Crembil. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 4: “Shimoni Slave Cave,” Cave_bureau with Phil Ayres and Jack Young, Centre for Biohybrid Architecture at the Royal Danish Academy. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 4: “Shimoni Slave Cave,” Cave_bureau with Phil Ayres and Jack Young, Centre for Biohybrid Architecture at the Royal Danish Academy. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 4: “Shimoni Slave Cave,” Cave_bureau with Phil Ayres and Jack Young, Centre for Biohybrid Architecture at the Royal Danish Academy. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 1: “Earth Compass,” Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 1: “Earth Compass,” Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Room 1: “Earth Compass,” Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025Additionally, at the 18th International Architecture Exhibition in 2023, the British Pavilion received a Special Mention for Dancing Before the Moon. Since 1937, the British Council has been the organizer of the British Pavilion, which features the top UK artists, architects, designers, and curators in the International Art and Architecture Exhibitions of La Biennale di Venezia.The British Pavilion serves as a significant forum for conversation about modern art and architecture thanks to these exhibitions and the British Council's Venice Fellowships program, which was launched in 2016.GBR – Geology of Britannic Repair can be visited at the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 which runs from Saturday 10 May to Sunday 23 November 2025.Find out all exhibition news on WAC's Venice Architecture Biennale page. Exhibition factsTitle: GBR – Geology of Britannic RepairCommissioner: Sevra Davis British Council; Curators: Owen Hopkins, Kathryn Yusoff, Kabage Karanja, Stella Mutegi; Exhibitors: cave_bureau, Palestine Regeneration Team (PART), Mae Ling Lokko & Gustavo Crembil, Thandi Loewenson; Venue: GiardiniThe exhibition will run from Saturday 10 May to Sunday 23 November 2025The British Pavilion is commissioned and managed by British Council Architecture.The top image in the article: Cave_bureau, Owen Hopkins and Kathryn Yusoff, Double Vision. Installation view, GBR - Geology of Britannic Repair, British Pavilion, 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2025. All images © Chris Lane, British Council.> via The British Pavilion

Recycled and reused construction materials turn Urko Sánchez Architects’ Waldorf campus in Nairobi into a teaching aid When designers at Urko Sánchez Architects received a commission to design a campus in Nairobi’s leafy Karen neighbourhood, the brief from the client, the Nairobi Waldorf School Trust, was direct and concise: design a school deep in the woods without harming the trees, while preserving the old, British colonial‑style structures that would house some classes and other amenities. The school’s lease on Miotoni Road, also in Karen, had run out and it had acquired a new 10‑year lease from a local landowner to gently develop a woodland site just south of its old premises. The old school buildings were to be demolished. The brief also stipulated that the architects use little to no concrete, avoid steel and masonry, and utilise other reversible building techniques that would allow the landowner to return the plot to its natural state once the school’s temporary lease elapsed. The budget was modest, at around US$250/m². Karen, a low‑density Nairobi suburb and once part of the coffee estate run by Danish author Karen Blixen in the 1910s and ’20s, is among the few areas in the city that have withstood the pressures of modern development. Here, buildings still mingle with indigenous trees. ‘The founders of Waldorf School were inclined towards a piece of property that brought nature to the students,’ says James Kioko, the school’s director. ‘We made it clear to the architects that we did not intend to interfere with the natural vegetation. We asked them, “what if you looked for a design that went around the trees?” They did.’ The result is a campus – one of two run by the Nairobi Waldorf School Trust in the city – spread across 20 rondavel‑style classrooms dotted around the lush groves. Patterned after local Maasai homesteads, they blend seamlessly into the forest, each a tranquil haven for young minds to grow within. As the 380 students – from kindergarten to Year 12 – sit down to learn, birdsong fills the air, and an occasional rustling of leaves and the rhythmic sound of raindrops tapping on the translucent rooftops add to the soothing white noise. Winding pathways lined with flowers connect the learning spaces, with every step being an adventure in nature. The site is a celebration of sustainable coexistence with nature. ‘Some saw a challenge but we saw an opportunity,’ says Jaime Velasco, Urko Sánchez’s country director for Kenya and lead architect on the Waldorf school project.  ‘In order to embed the classrooms in the forest, we needed to know what kind of trees grew where. What was the root system like? How much empty space was available for the desired building footprint?’ Numerous concepts were presented to the primary stakeholders, including the school board, management and parents. The administration also carried out a survey among the pupils as to the kind of school environment they would look forward to attending every day. ‘We engaged the older pupils logically while younger ones were given papers to sketch the look and feel of their new school,’ says Patrick Karanja, the pedagogical team chair in charge of academics and students’ welfare. And draw they did – from elaborate football pitches to swimming pools. The main takeaway, however, was that the pupils did not want traditional box classrooms, but more playful structures made from natural materials. ‘Visitors usually confuse the design of the classrooms for a luxury tourist campsite and ask, “where’s the school?”’ ‘We sketched on forest clearings then did a prototype, a mock‑up classroom which we brought to the planning meetings,’ says Velasco. ‘One area had a sizeable clearing and we knew right away that this was going to be the kindergarten, where small children could play with proper supervision.’  Taking the theme of the traditional courtyard, or boma, the classes began to ‘grow’ among the trees. Treated timber offcuts, salvaged from local suppliers as well as the old Miotoni Road school buildings, line the bottom quarter of each classroom’s facade, giving the impression of a structure fully grounded in the soil. The space between the double polycarbonate walls is filled with leftover soil excavated from the site and compost to create a ‘living wall’ where bugs and worms can find a home. Polycarbonate roofing invites the daylight in, and reduces the need for artificial lighting. In addition, several materials from dismantled classrooms from the previous school grounds were recycled to reduce waste, save on funds and add to the school’s sustainability lessons. For example, wooden floors and walls were repurposed as parapets, and old roofing tiles converted to path boundaries. To reduce congestion in the toilets, oil drums purchased at a local second‑hand market were strategically placed on the compound to serve as washing sinks while a shipping container from the old school currently serves as the library. Although a few trees had to give way for the playground, the logs were used to create the ‘forest’ screen of the multipurpose hall.  The school is representative of the broader work of Urko Sánchez, the Spanish founder of the eponymous architectural firm. Over the past decades, Sánchez has undertaken several projects on the African continent. Upon graduating in 1998, he volunteered on the first of these along the volatile Kenya‑Somalia border, before falling in love with Lamu Island on Kenya’s north‑eastern coast, one of the oldest civilisations in East Africa and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Sánchez’s first major project in Kenya was Lamu House, a boutique hotel in Lamu’s Old Town that encapsulates the peaceful and friendly nature of the Swahili coastline. Through his Mombasa office, Sánchez worked on other projects along the coast whose development is deeply rooted in local history and culture. His techniques tell the stories of Africa’s diverse communities, each structure a narrative of identity and resilience. He found joy in the intricate thatched roofs visible in almost every village on the continent, the vibrancy of whitewashed earthen walls, and the seamless integration of buildings into their natural surroundings. At the award‑winning Red Pepper House, another small private house in Lamu with a thatched roof, Sánchez had to balance local tradition with modern conveniences while taking care not to destroy the surrounding mangrove forest. Some of these techniques would go on to be replicated in the Nairobi school project. ‘Every project is unique,’ says Velasco, his rubber boots sloshing over wet leaves outside the kindergarten. ‘We are famous for Swahili architecture because our founder started the work in Lamu and the local context drew us to do that. In Nairobi, we were also faced with environmental issues and that is why the school came out like this.’ ‘The school has triggered serious conversations among the students on the need to protect Kenya’s environment’ The very design of the school is a source of pride not only to the learners but the local community too. Karanja tells the story of a child who brought his friends to the kindergarten classroom ‘just to see the tree popping out of the roof’ – an example of the very interaction with nature that the school was hoping for. ‘Visitors usually confuse the design of the classrooms for a luxury tourist campsite and ask, “where’s the school?”’ It has also triggered serious conversations among the students on the need to protect Kenya’s environment. While hiking local nature trails, they have seen firsthand the country’s dwindling forest cover. ‘They see the diminishing snow on Mount Kenya, the country’s highest peak, as a result of climate change,’ says Karanja. ‘Then they look at their school and understand why we need the trees. More trees mean more rain; more rain results in more snow cover.’ Kioko, the school director, reckons the school’s design does much more than just create a conducive learning environment – it lays the groundwork for nurturing thoughtful, adaptable and globally conscious students that are in tune with the Waldorf style of education. According to the Association of Waldorf Schools of North America, education ‘should address the whole child – their physical wellbeing, their social and emotional wellbeing, and their intellectual, cognitive and spiritual development’, with children being ‘encouraged to engage in imaginative play, hands‑on work, and outdoor and artistic activities’. Since the founding of the first Waldorf school in 1919, this pedagogical philosophy has taken original and often pioneering architectural forms around the world, with natural materials – especially wood – being preferred for early childhood settings. The school’s eco‑friendly elements, Kioko says, serve as live learning tools that encourage students to explore real‑world applications of science and technology. ‘If you look at the national goals of education in Kenya, we are not looking for academics,’ he says. ‘The country aims to bring out a child who will fit in the society. We need thinkers outside the box. We need collaborators. We need people who can critique things, not people who just recall what they were taught in class but who interact with the ecosystem and try to solve the challenges of the real world. That is our goal.’ For Urko Sánchez Architects and the Nairobi Waldorf School Trust community, architecture goes beyond creating structures, becoming a tool to foster connection between people, their culture and their land. At the Karen campus, this was a labour of love for nurturing the future generation and a tribute to the rich architectural heritage of the African continent.

Templo has created designs inspired by tectonic plates for the British Pavilion at this year’s Venice Biennale. The London-based studio worked on the visual identity, exhibition graphics, global marketing campaign and digital content for the pavilion, which has been commissioned by the British Council since 1937. It’s the third pavilion Templo has worked on, after they came through what Joanne Jolley, the British Council’s head of marketing, arts, called a “robust procurement process,” which included a paid creative pitch. “Templo stood out from the very beginning for their clear understanding of, and sensitivity to, the issues around the 2023 pavilion, which explored the everyday rituals of diaspora communities,” she says. “They know how to communicate these complicated subjects, but also bring joy into them through their designs.” Each year’s identity is treated as a new project, because the themes of each pavilion are very different, as is the level of input each curatorial team wants and expects into the process. For this year’s pavilion, commissioner Sevra Davis wanted to bring the British Council’s overarching mission – to foster ”cross cultural connection and collaboration”– into its Venice presence. “It struck me that this was a way to use the pavilion to celebrate what the British Council does in every other way, which is to connect across cultures to build trust, build connection, and build understanding,” Davis says. “I got a lot of flack for it, because people thought I had narrowed it down too much. But I think it’s incredibly exciting, the process of working together with the team in Kenya and other people all around the world. That’s what the British Council is all about, and so this becomes an exemplar of that.” Templo’s identity for this year’s British pavilion at the Venice Biennale Produced as part of the British Council’s UK/Kenya season of culture, this year’s exhibition looks “to examine the relationship between architecture and colonisation as parallel, interconnected systems.” GBR – Geology of Britannic Repair takes inspiration from the pavilion’s location on an axis that links the UK to Kenya and the Rift Valley, raising questions about power, politics, and identity. Installations include maps of the night sky above London and Nairobi the day Kenya gained independence from Britain in 1963, a bronze cast of the Rift Valley, and a room that explores how salvage materials could be used to rebuild war-torn Gaza. For Templo’s Pali Palavathanan and Anoushka Rodda, the approach spoke to many of their personal and professional interests. “Myself being Sri Lankan, and Anoushka’s family coming from Lebanon, which is the start of the Rift Valley, there were a lot of connections to who we are as a studio, and what we’re drawn to,” Palavathanan explains. This year’s British pavilion with its veil of beads This year’s British pavilion with its veil of beads The design approach was inspired by the veil of beads, made from agricultural waste and clay, which covers the angular British pavilion. The covering “softens and curves out this harsh imperial building,” Palavathanan says. They took a similar approach to the typeface, choosing Lithic for its angular, imperial sensibility and then using a “bevel effect to round off its harsh edges.” The secondary font is Flexa, chosen for its practical legibility. The red, green and black colour palette is taken from the Kenyan flag – despite Palavathanan’s initial misgivings that it would look “chaotic” – and the motion design is built on geological references. “Originally it was quite linear, but then we made it more like tectonic plates, like a rock formation converging with one another, or pulling apart. It all ties back to those themes of rift and repair.” The result is a thrillingly unusual combination of rhythms and patterns that feels very organic. And it speaks to one of Templo’s biggest challenges – to reflect the weighty subject matter of this year’s pavilion without making it feel too sombre. https://d3faj0w6aqatyx.cloudfront.net/uploads/2025/05/02-Geology-of-Britannic-Repair-teaser.mp4 “It’s an incredibly serious exhibition,” Palavathanan says. “It’s dealing with difficult things, but we want to be optimistic and playful in some ways, and the visual identity helps us to do that.” For Rodda, the fact that they know the British Council team so well gives them the confidence to push the creative direction. “The nice thing about these ongoing relationships is that you get a really good feel for what they prioritise, and what they find significant.” “That trust helps us push the boundaries more,” Jolley agrees. Exhibition graphics at this year’s British pavilion. Photo by Chris Lane. While around 80% of visitors to the Biennale will attend the UK exhibition, for Jolley and her team, a major focus is on the much bigger audience who won’t see the pavilion in person. Templo created a flythrough video so people can get a sense of how the exhibition unfolds, and they are also working with Kenyan influencers to create content that responds to this year’s themes. “We have to think a bit differently about how we can enrich the experience for people who won’t go to the exhibition,” Rodda says. “I think this the first time the British Council has done this, handing over control of part of the campaign.” Templo’s identity for this year’s British pavilion at the Venice Biennale Templo’s identity for this year’s British pavilion at the Venice Biennale Templo’s identity for this year’s British pavilion at the Venice Biennale Templo’s identity for this year’s British pavilion at the Venice Biennale