Terrachidia Oasis Campus
by Terrachidia NGO
M'Hamid El Ghizlane, Morocco
Project details
Year
2025
project year
2024
Site area
-
insight
Project website
Location
Team credits
architects
- Terrachidia NGO -
Marta Colmenares,
Oriol Domínguez,
Alejandro Hermida,
Carmen Moreno,
Raquel Peña,
Lucía Alcántara.
contributing partners
Hajar Karmane,
María Galán,
Khalifa Mharzi,
Abdelkader Laarija,
Abdelatiff Boussetta,
Local development associations.
Located in the old village of M’Hamid El Ghizlane, at the edge of the Sahara, Terrachidia Oasis Campus is an ongoing initiative dedicated to safeguarding the cultural and architectural heritage of a fragile oasis landscape. The region faces growing threats from desertification, depopulation and socioeconomic change. Responding to this vulnerability, the project links architectural restoration, cultural continuity and community empowerment.
Since 2012, Terrachidia NGO has hosted annual restoration workshops, each lasting one or two weeks, bringing together local craftsmen, women artisans, international participants and architecture heritage specialists. Each intervention focuses on restoring a symbolic public space, from communal courtyards to historical gateways, combining hands-on construction with knowledge exchange. The initiative has gradually expanded beyond building restoration to encompass broader aspects of intangible heritage, such as women’s crafts, local materials and traditional techniques. These workshops strengthen intergenerational learning, ensuring that endangered skills remain embedded in the life of the oasis.
Terrachidia’s design philosophy integrates preservation of tangible and intangible heritage, local development and architectural training. Its methodology is based on the principle that social, cultural and environmental goals should reinforce one another. The project promotes small, precise interventions that reveal how continuity and adaptation can coexist. Modern additions are modest and always developed in dialogue with the vernacular environment – adopting traditional construction solutions while subtly responding to new needs.
The team works exclusively with local, natural materials such as earth, wood and palm trunks. Earthen walls, palm leaves and tamarisk branches define both the structural and atmospheric character of the restored buildings, grounding them within the desert landscape. Techniques like tadelakt – a traditional lime plaster from Marrakech rarely used in this region – are reintroduced and adapted, reviving forgotten practices while ensuring durability and thermal comfort.
Social engagement lies at the heart of the project. Terrachidia’s workshops involve the entire community, from master builders and young apprentices to women’s cooperatives whose crafts and dyeing techniques enrich the architecture’s material palette. This collaboration strengthens local pride and agency, encouraging people to view their traditional skills not as remnants of the past but as tools for sustainable futures. The initiative also fosters economic resilience through tourism, education and local production, while highlighting the value of heritage as a resource for community development.
In ecological terms, Terrachidia Oasis Campus promotes circular construction and low-impact design. By using locally sourced materials and passive climate strategies – natural lighting, cross-ventilation and shading – it reduces the need for imported resources. The restoration work reinforces the environmental balance of the oasis, preserving its intricate relationship between built structures, agricultural fields and water systems.
Beyond architecture, the project functions as a cultural bridge, creating dialogue between local residents and participants from around the world. It challenges traditional hierarchies of expertise, positioning the local community as teachers rather than recipients. In doing so, it redefines architectural education as a collective, hands-on process rooted in care, reciprocity and respect for place.
Terrachidia NGO was founded by a group of architects specializing in heritage conservation and international cooperation, working alongside a network of local collaborators and community associations. Among them is architect and educator Carmen Moreno Adán, whose work focuses on the recovery and restoration of public spaces in traditional cities and who is a member of the LabOasis Foundation steering committee.
The prize money will fund a series of workshops aimed at strengthening vernacular earthen architecture and safeguarding traditional crafts. Training for master builders will address structural vulnerabilities, while programmes for women will ensure the intergenerational transmission of palm weaving and natural dyeing techniques. Scholarships will support young professionals, particularly from North Africa, creating new opportunities for education and collaboration. Part of the funding will go towards outreach and dissemination, ensuring that the knowledge developed at M’Hamid continues to inspire and sustain communities far beyond the oasis.
- Information for the project text was provided by Terrachidia NGO -
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Advisory Committee Statement
‘Terrachidia Oasis Campus’ receives the award for Local Scale for the way it combines an architectural preservation training programme with the local knowledge of traditional construction methods and materials in the M’Hamid Oasis in Morocco. Terrachidia NGO, a collective of architectural heritage experts and local collaborators, has developed a model that not only draws on local know-how but actively sustains and transmits it to future generations. Though initiated by external experts, the programme carefully balances outside influence with local agency, ensuring that preservation efforts remain rooted in community knowledge and participation. The way it facilitates training the local community in restoring architectural heritage, rather than relying on an imposed external approach, is particularly commendable.