Women's Bazaar
“We challenge the innovative minds around the globe to design a marketplace with an operational plan that enables people living in one of the refugee settlements ..to reassert their dignity by being able to exercise their entrepreneurial creativity and skills through an informal marketplace, to benefit in particular women, adolescents and the most vulnerable”.
Among 700 participants from 150 universities in 34 countries, the project 'Women’s Bazaar in Zaatari’ from the In Transit 2 studio won the international architectural competion ‘Place and Displacement – a Marketplace in Refugee Settlements' organized by the Non-Governmental Organization International Development in Action (IDeA).
ZAATARI REFUGEE CAMP, JORDAN (text from IDeA)
Adjacent to the Syrian Border, Zaatari Refugee Camp is located near the Mafraq City of Jordan, a regional trade center. Established in 2012, 430,000 refugees have since passed through, with around 80,000 currently living here. Zaatari Camp is closely regulated by a joint effort from the Jordanian government and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). International organizations offer temporary shelters like tents and caravans to the refugee families. Refugee inhabitants can only decide their own living conditions within the framework provided by the administrating organizations. Setting up business here requires permissions, but inhabitants in Zaatari has created various forms of businesses including restaurants, cafes, clothes and furniture shops. However, targeted livelihood support for vulnerable demographics is still needed in Zaatari Camp.
WOMEN’S BAZAAR IN ZAATARI (text by authors)
The 'Women’s Bazaar in Zaatari’ project proposes a private space for women, a place where they can feel safe and strong, and find the tools they need for developing a business.
Zaatari consists of about an equal amount of men and women, but only a few prosent of the shop owners are women. In fact, out of all the residents employed in the camp, very few are women. Za’atari women report that money is scarce, and that their family only survives on what is provided by the UN. They also find it challenging to find paid work, and in addition to this, one of the greatest challenges they face is the taboo around women working. However, this is slowly starting to change as people discover the need for and the benefits of giving women a chance to provide an income for their families. This is amplified through programs provided by the UN and NGOs, generating jobs for women, like garbage collectors, tailoring instructors and more . This enables vulnerable households to increase their income, while empowering women through work.
The Women’s Market is planned as a protected market place, connected to the United Nations Women compound, with workshops, child care, social areas, and retail spaces. The shops are both the barrier and the link between the inner market place (the courtyard), and the public market street. The storefronts facing the market street only open as windows, creating safety for the women through a physical barrier. Towards the inner market place, the stores can be opened entirely.
Providing women with a chance to be self-reliable - strengthening their social networks, and increasing their purchasing power - will not only have an immediate social impact improving the well-being of entire families, but it will also benefit the Za’atari market’s economy.
Construction/ Structure
The Women’s Market can be built, with supervision, by workers with no prior training, and by only using common tools. The structure is based on a simple scaffolding system, with a gabion wall as ‘cladding’. The scaffolding is low-cost, locally available, durable, and highly efficient in its double-function as traditional tool for the erection of the gabion wall, as well as a finished architectural element in itself. This is a sustainable system from which the elements can be sold back to the host community up disassembly. The gabion wall is assembled using typical steel modules, lined with wire mesh, and filled with gravel, or, conceivably, a variety of discarded or unused construction debris that might exist on the site. The construction system is scalable, and can be assembled to form different spatial configurations.