2.2 Functions Design

● Typology of ‘Women’s House’

Figure 2-2: Promote gender equality in Africa ("Balouo Salo - Women's House" , 2021)

The design of the ‘women’s house’ is to create a sustainable and symbolic building through the passive design and the use of the natural materials, together with an ecological landscape to promote new opportunities in enhancing gender equality and women’s empowerment. Unlike other facility types of buildings within the Baghere village, the women’s house is designed for women, which enable women to organize activities, seminars and meetings, undertake skill training, receive education, as well as to consult physical and mental health from specialists in order to understand and improve their own values and upskill people in rural area in Senegal. Besides, due to the religious character that the village of Baghere orientated ("Balouo Salo - Women's House" , 2021), the women’s house seeks to not only conform to local living habits, but also establish a more inclusive and forward-looking public service that enable women to educate, work and live.

2.2 Functions Design

The design is focused on the multi-functional use of place with a total area of 124 square meters (Figure 2-3). Rather than just focus on women, providing some platforms such as wall exhibitions and open-space activity areas aimed to connect local males and females that improve the recognition of gender equality (Figure 3&4). According to the functions suggested by Balouo Salo ("Balouo Salo - Women's House" , 2021), which are management and organization of activities, communication between institutions and associations, and collective activities for promoting human rights and gender equality, our design is considering combining these functions with our aims of educating womens on knowledge, hygiene and working skills through having enough space that is adaptable and flexible to accommodate the activities.

Figure 2-3: Room arrangement floor plan

Figure 2-4: Top view (Roofing)

● Meeting room and Consultation areas

Figure 2-5. West building zone of women’s house

The west zone of the women’s house has a largest area of 60 square meters and it is used as the administrative functions that manage the private consultations and meetings. Visitors or residents can enter the women’s house from the greeting point entrance to make appointments or ask for guidance.

The women’s house will provide two private rooms for medical or mental consultation. The private consultation rooms can be used not only to address local women’s health or psychological problems during daytime, but also as a temporary shelter for women who have suffered from domestic violence during the night.

Besides, as required in this project, the 30 square meters meeting room is big enough to accomodate more than 15 people. The use of folding tables and chairs makes it easy to change the layout of the space, so that the meeting room is not only used for meetings, but also can be used as an activity room and rest area (Figure 2-6). Foldable bamboo panels can be used to divide the room to achieve space flexibility and versatility (Figure 2-8). Three entrances open to meeting rooms also facilitates the multi-function use of the room.

● Education center/ Exhibition area

The purpose of the south building zone is to promote gender equality as an exhibition hall and a place for education and training. This area has 30 square meters and it is planned to open to the public. Therefore, people can enter the building through the two entrances. In order to improve the literacy level, hygiene awareness and working ability of local women, relevant education and competence training will be carried out in this area. The folding panels made of bamboo can divide the space so that different types of class or training can be taught simultaneously.

Figure 2-9. Wall exhibition ("WHAT'S HAPPENING IN THE ART ROOM??" , 2021)

To fully use the space, the wall will be used as an exhibition wall to display posters, photographs, information and knowledge that promote hydenie and women’s values (Figure 2-8). Besides, there will be bookcases with books provided in the corner and portable tables and chairs provided in the space for reading and learning.

● Outdoor Activity Area/ Seminar

Figure 2-11. View from outside of pavilion

The open design for the activity area is more in line with the lifestyle of Baghere. It is stated that people like to gather together to discuss matters outdoors in the shading areas and many important festivals are celebrated outdoors("Culture of Senegal - history, people, clothing, traditions, women, beliefs, food, customs, family" , 2021). Therefore, the design of the pavilion provides a place for people to shelter from the sun and rain during activities (Figure 2-11). There will be no tables and chairs in the pavilion because it provides flexibility for carrying out activities and local people are used to sitting on the ground during conversations or seminars.

● Toilets

It is necessary to separate toilets under the religion of Muslim by provide privacy of men and women, so we design seperate toilets in the women’s house. One of the squat toilets is for men and the rest of the two toilets (one squat toilet and one toilet pan) are for women (Figure 2-11). The squat toilet uses the ecological system to manage the feces, whereas the toilet pan uses the ECOSAN toilet system to manage the exhaust blood for women who are in period. Both systems are not required to washout the feces, but to keep the toilet clean, recycled grey water will be used to washout the toilets when it is needed.

In order to raise awareness of sanitary health, a hand washing area is located outside the toilet for people to clean their hands regularly. Furthermore, considering that different people may have different habits on sanitary, both toilet paper and clean water will be provided from buckets that enable people to clean themselves after going to the toilet.