Beneath mango trees in the lush garden of the Palais de Lom\u00e9, an oceanside estate in the Togolese capital, dozens of students from the African School of\u00a0Architecture\u00a0and Urban Planning (EAMAU) were taking sessions on archiving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Established in 1905, the palace housed German, French and British colonial governors in succession and then the Togolese presidency before falling into disuse in the 1990s. After a five-year restoration project, its doors were opened to the public in 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These days, it houses an exhibition paying homage to records from across west and central Africa, as well as the Nana Benzes,\u00a0the wax print merchants\u00a0who ran the fabrics scene from the 1960s to the 1980s. There is also a discotheque and a 26-acre botanical park with sculptures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The palace \u201cwas supposed to be a centre of power \u2026 and so the city was designed around here\u201d, said Sonia Lawson, the founding director of the Palais de Lom\u00e9 renovation and cultural project. \u201cSo that\u2019s why we want to be a place of conversations around architecture.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In November, she and\u00a0Studio Neida, an interdisciplinary architecture, design and curatorial firm based between Togo and Germany, hosted the first Lom\u00e9 Architectural Encounters forum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In attendance were speakers including the British-Ghanaian architect\u00a0Nana Biamah-Ofosu, who discussed her research on the African compound house. Beside the trees where sessions were held, an open-air red brick encampment housed an exhibition on tropical modernism, a style native to west Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Uncompleted and abandoned buildings are a regular feature of cityscapes in west\u00a0Africa. Some have even become landmarks used in giving directions. The reasons for their condition are legion, but they include government mismanagement and inefficiency, and even incidents of relatives scamming members of the diaspora who want to build homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many buildings remain uncompleted or abandoned for years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn my family, we had a building project that \u2026 was initiated in 1993 and it supposedly got completed in 2018,\u201d said Dominique Petit-Fr\u00e8re, a conference speaker and co-founder of the design and research practice Limbo Accra.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Palais de Lom\u00e9, an exception to the norm, is the case study that tiny Togo is presenting to kickstart a conversation on resuscitating and archiving architecture in Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But as imposing as it is, the restored estate tells only half the tale. Less than three miles away stands a monument to Togo\u2019s indecision about whether writing a new era of history involves reclaiming some parts but dispensing with others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The majestic 216-room Hotel de la Paix was launched by the government in the 1970s and in its heyday quickly became a rendezvous spot for high-flying west Africans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHotel de la Paix is an emblematic building which also bears witness to the history of Togo,\u201d said the Lom\u00e9-based architect Sabrine Bako, who participated in the Palais de Lom\u00e8 renovation. \u201cIn post-independence, when Togo wanted to give itself an international status, it was one of the first luxury hotels that was built \u2026 it was a glorious period.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Two decades later, the hotel, which also faces the ocean, became a skeleton of its glorious self after mismanagement and state neglect robbed it of its shine. A new hotel now occupies part of the grounds, while the government has reportedly earmarked the main complex for demolition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere are solutions to preserve this architectural heritage,\u201d said Bako. \u201cThat\u2019s my opinion but it\u2019s the politicians that decide.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For some, it is the Hotel de la Paix, rather than the Palais de Lom\u00e9, that represents the true state of archiving architecture across the continent. Olufemi Hinson Yovo, a Beninese architect who runs an Instagram account called @Cotonou.Architecture to catalogue disappearing relics, said many administrators across the region had a disdain towards heritage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAll I see from all stand points of different west African cities and governments on heritage is \u2018either it\u2019s in a good place where there\u2019s attraction to tourism and then we can renovate it, but if it\u2019s not we just destroy it and and build something on top of it\u2019,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn Dakar, in Cotonou we wake up every day to a heritage building being destroyed \u2026it\u2019s like an epidemic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Even though there are architecture departments across west Africa\u2019s many universities, EAMAU, which was established in 1975, remains the region\u2019s major specialty college. Many of its graduates, like Bako, are well-known. But experts say the curriculum needs updating to better adapt to local needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The political will for long-term change is slow to come, but more private citizens are stepping into the arena.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dakar, for example, is the scene of a growing renaissance of artists placing architectural relics at the centre of their work. At the conference, the Senegalese-Cameroonian architect Nzinga Mboup discussed one such initiative: Dakarmorphose, a tech-driven initiative by her and partner Carole Diop to map the city\u2019s heritage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is also Limbo Accra, which works to transform unfinished buildings and has created a\u00a0digital repository\u00a0for them in order to \u201cfind new ways of mitigating what we\u2019re dealing with in our cities\u201d, according to Petit-Fr\u00e8re.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yovo hopes these initiatives will spur others on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cRenovating such a place as Palais de Lom\u00e9 is a huge feat,\u201d she said. \u201cThat I could take a taxi from Cotonou and come here three hours away from home and be with world-class architects, emerging world-class architects \u2026 it\u2019s fantastic that it\u2019s happening but we need way more than this.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Beneath mango trees in the lush garden of the Palais de Lom\u00e9, an oceanside estate in the Togolese capital, dozens of students from the African School of\u00a0Architecture\u00a0and Urban Planning (EAMAU) were taking sessions on archiving. Established in 1905, the palace housed German, French and British colonial governors in succession and then the Togolese presidency before […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,2,212],"tags":[7,30,213],"class_list":{"0":"post-39917","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-culture","8":"category-featured","9":"category-history","10":"tag-apie-project","11":"tag-culture","12":"tag-history"},"yoast_head":"\n