Secondary school in Roong Village

1st phase

Roong, Takeo Province, Cambodia
2012—2014: design and realization of the second stage
GFA 740 sqm
Beneficiaries School students and Roong community
Partners Missione Possibile onlus, Architecture for Humanity, Building Trust International
Funds Otto per mille Chiesa Valdese, private funds

In 2012, Missione Possibile called us to design a new secondary school in Roong, a Cambodian rural village, 50 km from Phnon Penh. We conceived a project organized in two different phases. The 1st phase was completed in 2014 and has led to the construction of 6 classrooms, 2 collective spaces, 2 offices, and a separated building for the bathrooms. The main building is characterized by a rigorous shape: a single pitched roof, sustained by bamboo beams supported by three bearing walls.

The project was an opportunity to rethink the spatial hierarchy of a Cambodian school, enhancing the value and use of collective roofed spaces. In particular, we worked on the element of the corridor by expanding its size and giving it a new life, becoming something other than a transit space.

We have employed local materials, to foster new building processes, which are affordable and easy to reproduce. In particular, we designed mudbricks and bamboo beams to standardize and somehow “industrialize” their making process and training locals.