Past Panama Trips!

Global Architecture Brigades is a student-run organization dedicated to the research, design, and construction for architectural problems in the developing world. There are different sectors of Global Brigades such as Dental, Medical, Business, Water, Etc. Previously GAB had a more general focus in different countries in Central America. However, now GAB has moved to Honduras and is focusing on developing the health and education infrastructures in the rural communities. 

To learn more information about Global Architecture Brigades, or the other Global Brigade sectors, follow this link: http://www.globalbrigades.org/

Over the past two years our Global Architecture Brigades chapter has had three successful trips to Panama and Honduras. We ventured to Panama in March of 2010 for our first design trip. The project was in an extremely rural part of Panama, near Santiago. We worked and lived with the community of El Salto for a week while we worked on the design at night. The community is located near 22 natural waterfalls, and was struggling to sustain itself with its very little income from farming. Our job was to design an eco-cabin, to help bring in tourists into the community and create a new source of revenue. In August of 2010 we returned to Panama to start the construction of the eco-cabin. This week long trip was dedicated to gathering the materials on site and assembling as much of the project as we could, in such a short period of time. We were able to learn about the craft of the farmers through mixing concrete and cutting and tying rebar by hand. Here are some pictures of the past two trips that do not do any justice for the Panamanian country side!

Natural Waterfalls

Model (no glue and about 90% humidity...)

Construction Crew