Manilla Caravanserai

Cote Competition, Iowa State University, 2016

This is an adaptive reuse project with the goal of retrofitting a vacant school building in the small Iowa town Manilla into an energy efficient building and create a dynamic and active community by bringing people from other places to Manilla. Thus, the program is developed based on Iowa’s culture of food production The current location and situation of Manilla school and the need of community leaded to design a mixed used space between Des Moines and Omaha like a Caravanserai, where the food and drink production can circulate the local economy and energize the community. Combining the current situation of the building, its existing form, and additions during different years with our proposed program lead to the design of an extensive circulation through all buildings and landscape that also incorporate with natural light and air circulation by using the existing structure and shafts of the buildings for providing environmental comfort.

The landscape is designed naturally without modifying the topography, in a way that motivates people to explore its beauty, function and productivity and the footprint of the building is almost unaltered to save the landscape. The land is mainly designed for productive purposes, a source for the market and restaurant’s vegetable and chicken and also on the roof of the distillery and shrimp farming energy can be generated by using the PV arrays. The average number of 450 KWH energy produced per day for the distillery and 84 KWH energy per day for the shrimp farming could be enough for the production of whiskey and shrimp, needed in the complex. For flood mitigating the water on site, rain garden and green spaces like grass lands and vegetation are designed based on the land’s slope. The pavements are preamble to avoid run-off into the street sewer system. Water from the roofs and central court are gathered and filtered for the building’s use.

Local vegetation and trees (Malus Pumila, Black Oak, Apple Orchard) provide the natural habitat for local birds and animals without the need for extra irrigation. Also, vegetation beside energizing the environment perform as shading device for the west side of the building. The site also provides space for social activities like open air market, open air amphitheater and sitting areas in the nice weather outside of the building.