In the quiet rustle of bamboo poles lashed together with steel joints, a revolution is unfolding – one that speaks not of steel and glass towers, but of survival, dignity, and radical empathy.
Khudi Bari, meaning “Small House” in Bengali, is more than a shelter. It is a manifesto in bamboo, a floating dream on the shifting sandbars of the Meghna River, and now, a globally celebrated icon of climate-responsive architecture after being awarded the prestigious Aga Khan Award for Architecture in the 16th Award Cycle (2023-2025).
Designed by Marina Tabassum, one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2024, Khudi Bari emerged not from a high-tech studio, but from the urgency of a pandemic and the rising waters of a drowning nation.
Born during the 2020 lockdown, it was conceived as a lifeline for Bangladesh’s landless communities, families living precariously on riverine sandbanks (chars), displaced seasonally by floods, cyclones, and the slow violence of climate change.
A shelter that moves with the water
Bangladesh, crisscrossed by 700 rivers fed by the rapidly melting Himalayan glaciers, faces a climate paradox: it contributes less than 0.5 per cent of global emissions, yet bears the brunt of climate chaos. As Marina Tabassum poignantly notes: “The people who have had to relocate and live on the sandbanks have a carbon footprint of zero, and yet they are the ones suffering from the climate crisis.”
Khudi Bari answers this injustice with elegance and pragmatism. It is a modular, demountable space frame made from locally sourced bamboo and custom steel connectors, engineered for resilience and mobility. Three people can disassemble, transport, and rebuild it using simple tools, no cranes, no electricity, no concrete jungle required.
Its genius lies in its duality:
Ground level: A semi-open social and private space for daily life, cooking, and community.
Upper level: A raised sleeping platform that doubles as a flood refuge, rising above seasonal deluges that swallow entire villages.
With a shallow foundation anchored to the earth and a corrugated metal roof designed for durability and ease of transport, Khudi Bari is both rooted and ready to flee, a paradox made possible by thoughtful design.
Vernacular wisdom, reimagined
Tabassum didn’t invent a new architecture. She listened to it.
The form of Khudi Bari echoes the gabled roofs and raised floors of traditional Bengali rural homes, structures shaped by centuries of coexistence with water. But she reinterpreted them through a lens of modernity, scalability, and equity.
The façades are intentionally open-ended. Walls can be made from any locally available material, from woven mats to recycled tin, allowing communities to adapt the design to their culture, climate, and resources. This is architecture not for people, but with them.
From emergency shelter to community catalyst
What began as a prototype for individual homes has evolved into a social infrastructure. Through her initiative, the Foundation for Architecture and Community Equity (FACE), Tabassum has scaled Khudi Bari into aggregation centres for women farmers, and vibrant community hubs in Rohingya refugee camps in Ukhia of Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar.
In these spaces, displaced women gather to process crops, share stories, learn skills, and reclaim agency. The structure, once a symbol of survival, has become a vessel for empowerment and collective resilience.
“Architecture,” says Tabassum, “should not only shelter the body, but also dignify the spirit.”
In a powerful act of architectural diplomacy, a Khudi Bari was installed at the Vitra Campus in Germany, a sacred ground of design, home to masterpieces by Zaha Hadid, Tadao Ando, and Frank Gehry. Placed among icons of modernism, this humble bamboo structure stood as a quiet but searing critique.
Rolf Fehlbaum, founder of the Vitra Design Museum, called it a symbol of “new thinking”—a shift toward sustainability, humility, and social responsibility in design.
“Marina Tabassum applies the kind of designs we expect from an urban architect to pro-bono initiatives in very challenging conditions. She is a role model for a socially engaged architectural practice.”
At the Venice Architecture Biennale, Khudi Bari was woven into a triptych of tapestries by designer Arinjoy Sen, crafted by marginalised artisans in Bengal, further blurring the lines between architecture, art, and activism.
Why the Aga Khan Jury chose it
The independent Master Jury praised Khudi Bari not just for its technical ingenuity, but for its moral clarity. In a world where architecture often serves the privileged, Khudi Bari flips the script. It is: Climate-responsive; built to withstand floods, storms, and erosion; community-driven; designed through dialogue, built by locals, owned by the people.
It is scalable and replicable. Funded by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), it is being deployed across Bangladesh’s most vulnerable regions. It is culturally resonant: A modern interpretation of vernacular wisdom.
As one juror noted: “This is architecture at its most essential – light, mobile, dignified. It doesn’t just respond to crisis. It redefines what shelter can mean in the age of climate emergency.”
The future of Khudi Bari
Over 100 units have already been built. But the vision is larger. FACE is exploring floating versions, solar-integrated models, and urban micro-housing for Dhaka’s slum dwellers. The structure is being studied as a blueprint for climate adaptation across South and Southeast Asia.
Khudi Bari is proof that small can be revolutionary. That a house made of bamboo and steel joints can carry the weight of a global message: Equity. Resilience. Hope.
In the words of Marina Tabassum, standing beside her creation on the banks of the Meghna: “We are not building houses. We are building the right to belong to land, to safety, to a future.”
And in that, Khudi Bari has already changed architecture forever.
Winner of the 2025 Aga Khan Award for Architecture
Khudi Bari – Marina Tabassum Architects / FACE
Bangladesh | Climate-Responsive Design | Community Equity | Modular Housing
One of seven recipients sharing the $1 million prize