Earth Village

The minority village sat on a mountain top in the country’s far north, known for its costumes, festivals, brocade, herbal baths and rammed earth houses, but isolated and poor, with houses crowded against cattle barns. With help from the Vietnamese design team and a Swiss charity, the community chose to relocate to the foot of the mountain, improving living conditions, opening to tourism and keeping its identity.

The new village groups five to seven households around a shared pond and biogas tank. Since 2002, 50 buildings have gone up using local methods and materials: 30 farmhouses for farming and tourist services, 18 homestays whose roofs can be raised to turn old storerooms into guest rooms, and a kindergarten built with materials and labour donated by villagers.

The community house and homestay is the village’s landmark: two storeys with rammed earth walls 80 cm thick, holding meeting spaces, a small museum and five bedrooms, with verandas, voids and a folded roof like a swallow’s wings. Rammed earth and timber keep buildings cool in summer and warm in winter.