Dakar is a coastal city located on the west coast of Africa.
This is a residential house located in the outskirts of Dakar City designed by www.a4architect.com.
Plot Size.
The plots in this area are 10m by 15m, much smaller than the usual Kenyan size of 1/8th acre of 15m by 30m.
This has necessitated for a different type of building compared to the ones we have in Kenya . Residential houses here have to go 3 or 4 storeys high so as to accommodate 3 or 4 bedrooms. In Kenya, since most minimum sized plots are 1/8th acre, this gives enough room for 3 or 4 bedroomed houses to be 2 floor levels.
Room sizes.
In this design, the ground floor has a lounge and car park area, kitchen and guest room in the 2nd floor, more bedrooms in the 3rd floor and a family room, entertainment room in the 4th floor level.
Architecture style.
The Style that is mostly preferred in Senegal is Islamic, most Senegalese are Islamic .
www.a4architect.com has designed this Dakar house using Islamic architectural elements such as flat roof, detailed intricate doric columns, intricate wall patterns, arches over windows and doors, large balconies and stepped railing wall on the top most floor.
Security.
The ground floor has very few windows to prevent burglaries, making the building quite hard for a burglar to break in and gain entry. Crime rates in Dakar are just like in Nairobi. Check comparisons here https://versus.com/en/dakar-vs-nairobi
This has necessitated for architecture interventions to thwart possibility of crime/break ins.
Conclusion.
Dakar Physical planning and architecture responds very well to building in areas where land is scarse since they utilize verticality much more than in Kenya, with residential buildings spreading vertically in several storeys, stacking upwards, compared to Kenya where the buildings tend to sprawl and extend horizontally, reducing ground foot print. Reduced ground foot print reduces tha amount of land available for agricultural use, tree growing for sequestering Carbon from the atmosphere, hence more detrimental to the environment.
Architect Francis Gichuhi Kamau.
info@a4atchitect.com
0721410684
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