The Equiano Centre in Waterloo, Sierra Leone, is a library for a community that missed over a decade of education during the country’s bloody civil war. Designed by architect Willson & Bell and engineer Ramboll Whitby Bird, the £1 million project goes on site early next year and will be ready by mid-2009.

The library is being delivered by the Waterloo Partnership Developments, the projects arm of a twinning charity linking the community of Waterloo, Liverpool, with its west African namesake.

The charity was set up by Liverpool MP Claire Curtis-Thomas who visited Sierra Leone in 2006 and later called on the help of engineer Mark Whitby. His firm then appointed Willson & Bell to develop the vaulted-roof courtyard design.

Ramboll Whitby Bird associate Paul Steen visited the site to help consult local people. “The community was asked what capital development project would make most difference — perhaps water supply, or power. But they said a library — if young people could be educated, they themselves would be able to sort out the rest,”he said.

The 500-seat library will be built by a local contractor using in-situ concrete. Concrete fins painted in different colours provide solar shading in the equatorial climate.

“It’s quite raw in the technology, it’s an honest building, and we like to think a little bit Louis Kahn,” said architect Nick Willson. “It’s concrete, wood, glass and stone — materials the local contractors can use.”

The project will also be used a case study for developing local skills, and Ramboll Whitby Bird will send site engineers to Sierra Leone to help this process.

The centre is named after Olaudah Equiano, a freed slave whose vivid 1789 autobiography contributed to the abolition of slavery 200 years ago. Half the funding has been provided by a single anonymous donor, but the project needs further support. Visit www.waterloopartnership.co.uk for details.

BD Magazine - Public Buildings - December 2007