ABSTRACT
Light Earth Designs has created a handsome cricket pavilion in Rwanda using local skills and natural materials. Its design adopts a structural method that adapts an ancient Mediterranean method of tile vaulting, or Catalan vaulting, but takes the thinking a lot further, using parametric computational methods and a refreshed understanding of material properties. This case study highlights the process of making rapid progress, at a number of moments in history, by applying new knowledge to traditional techniques and introducing smart, innovative thinking to established practices. The concept of the pavilion mirrors parabolic trace of a bouncing cricket ball, following the natural resolution of forces towards the ground. The three arches decrease in size from a 16 m span to a 9 m span, with each space housing a different aspect of the cricket stadium. In 2012, Light Earth Designs conceived the cricket pavilion on the outskirts of Kigali, Rwanda, using soil-tile vaulting, which opened for its inaugural match in 2017.
