Help publish The ‘Big Book 77’ for Ethiopian cities & villages – Architectural & Urban Design Book

Help publish The 'Big Book 77' for Ethiopian cities & villages - Architectural & Urban Design Book

Help this important & beautiful book to become a reality

official title

Big Book 77
Projects for the capital of Tigray
Sustainable Architectural & Urban Design for Sub-Saharan Africa City

What was going on with contemporary architectural design in sub-Saharan Africa, Mekelle, Tigray before war?

Conditions: 2000 m altitude, Ethiopian highlands, big lack of water,
big lack of electricity, poor internet.
Facts: 77 people, 77 projects, 365 days, D.Batista's PhD theoretical texts, design & concepts, practical recommendations & suggestions

My name is Dominika Batista PhD, Slovenia, and I was invited 5 years ago to lecture on the School of Architecture and Urban Planning, Mekelle University in Tigray, Ethiopia.

I wrote an architectural book, and graphic designer and photographer Damjan Jermančič designed it.

Watch the video titled "The Birth of the Great Big Book 77"

It was actually a very important architectural multimedia exhibition 77, unique in Ethiopia.

Here you can learn more about Exhibition 77

Big Book 77 data

Author: Dominika Batista PhD, Architect & Associate Professor
Design: Damjan Jermančič MDes, Graphic Designer and Photographer
Book: 366 pages, cca 60% of pages is graphic material, cca 40% pages texts, english language, landscape A4 format

For who is this book?
Locally a book is intended as a Professional Guide for architects, planners, investors, developers, and their clients of Ethiopian cities and the state government, general public and citizens.
It is intended as Manual with appropriate Designs & Concepts, appropriate Suggestions & Recommendations more broadly but still locally for libraries of total 30 universities of Ethiopia, for Ethiopian government offices as a professional guide towards architectural sustainable ecological direction, and to the professional audience, as an example ‘think global act local’.

Big book 77 will serve as manual to connect the economy and the academic sphere on the field of architectural construction, not only in resilience way but equilibrium in Ethiopia.

Globally it is intended to the professionals and general public with a sense of aesthetics and interest in the design and art of living on the planet Earth.

This book will place Ethiopia & its Universities as a contributor on the world map of architectural design books.

What is this book talking about?
Beside the topics on professional design methods, examples and study/learning cases, the Big Book 77 also speaks about the importance/addressing huge daily Ethiopian problems of:
Naming the Streets, Future Eco-traffic solutions, Increasing potential of local originality, City rivers, Food eco sustainable markets, Fountains & Water stepwells, Green & Architecture, Hygiene, Master trees, Preserving Identity, Protecting heritage: natural & built, Sanitary & Restrooms, Shopping windows bars, Water tanks & Architecture, Water tower & Architecture, Water, Wire fences and much much more.

What is already done?
The ‘Big Book 77’ is already written by me and designed by my husband in 2019. We are also editors.

What Big Book 77 needs now?
A publisher & distributer.

Please have a look inside of the 'Big Book 77'

Why this book is so important to be published?

• There are almost no books available in Ethiopia counrty of 110 milion people, and the number of them is really low on all of 30 universities.

• There is general brutal mismanagement of space - natural & built - harmful to people, fauna, flora and environment as a whole.

• All students are mostly learning from Internet source, which is not appropriate and in most cases very misleading

• Architectural spatial development in Ethiopia is on a very basic level

• This book might be the best thing in architectural/construction field to happen in many decades in Ethiopia.

• In this book Ethiopians will find a lot of knowledge, that has been lacking so far, about not to harm the natural environment on a large scale, with wrong constructions

• This book will save lives in the future.