Informal Settlement Engages with Ancestral Lands
Nyalenda, Kisumu on Lake Victoria, Kenya | 2023
Kina’s Fall 2023 University of Pennsylvania’s design studio was located on Lake Victoria in between a vast papyrus wetland, a cultivated and ancestral agricultural area that experiences regular flood events, and the informal settlement of Nyalenda. Building on the organic development pattern of this neighborhood, she and her partner, Marcus Owens’, goals were to enhance neighborhood social services and amenities, create greater environmental resiliency and honor the cultural practice of burying ancestors adjacent to dwellings by developing a community forest honoring those who came prior.