Architecture Sans Frontieres - UK

About the charity

ASF is making community and international development issues, in particular those impacting on disadvantaged and vulnerable people, integral to the practice and teaching of architecture.

Our motivation for establishing ASF stems from an ambition to make architectural practice more relevant to the majority of the world’s population who are living in marginalised or poverty situations (both in the UK and worldwide). At architecture school students are taught to provide solutions to complex issues, however, often people in communities benefit more from being involved in the process of development than by being disempowered recipients of more often inappropriate solutions. It was these frustrations that lead a small team of dedicated volunteers to create ASF and in doing so establish an organisation that supports architectural education by teaching (and working with) the essential participatory tools and techniques required when working as a professional in community or international development projects.