PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
El Forastero de Kallari
Challenge
The Kallari cooperative needs their own chocolate and handicrafts factory that embraces their sustainable approach to their livelihood and environment. Banking on fair trade and the worldwide consumer using the internet, they have successfully launched the beginnings of an organic chocolate industry in the Amazon. We believe this recipe ensures the smell of success.
Concept
The site is located south of the town of Baeza and is adjacent to Highway E20, a major roadway linking the towns of Quito on the north and Tena on the south. The cacao plantations are generally located south of the site where the cacao farmers harvest the cacao, travel north to transport their produce to the site for chocolate production and the chocolate bars are then transported to Quito to be sold at the Kallari coffee shop.
Drawing inspiration from the mature cacao pod and all the interconnected seeds represents the idea behind the site as well as the interconnectedness of the buildings.
The site is approached from Quito from the main road where the visitors can explore the site form the top of the hill. Visitors and users alike will be greeted by the cable transportation system “zipping” above their heads ending with the parking rotunda and drop-off. The parking area shall utilize pervious pavement and bamboo stakes for auxiliary parking.
Approaching the visitor center, located off the parking and bus drop off area, is the celebration plaza. The visitor center has a large gallery space which can be used as an auditorium for lectures. The space has a bamboo garden featured at the center. The garden represents the beginning of the Forastero system utilizing bamboo as the site’s main material and feature. The visitor center also has a café which welcomes visitors to taste chocolate. The celebration plaza has views towards the river and the botanical gardens, and marketplace. The building is also ADA accessible. The journey begins walking through the paths toward the factory. On its way, you may stop by the marketplace where the local Kallari community has a set of studios where each can produce their local handicrafts. The plaza at the marketplace gives the visitors and the local community opportunities to not only observe how the handicrafts are made but also to try a hand at making their own handicrafts as well as purchasing them. The market place and plaza is in close proximity to the Cosanga river. Emerging towards the river is a deck for the visitors and the community to enjoy the view of the river and the surrounding ecosystem. From the endpoint of the deck the view towards the Forastero system is seen.
The site is also strongly designed for its main users: The Kallari community. Approaching south of the site, whether by foot or by bus, the main roads as a bus stop along with a zipline tower. As the farmers bring their cacao harvest to the factory for processing, the cacao seeds are carried in sacks which will be secured to a gravity driven transportation cable system instantly delivering the beans directly to the factory to be dried and processed for chocolate production. Select cable towers are designed to have a viewing deck which will also be used for maintaining the cable system.
Trucks access the site through the service road which leads to the factory’s loading dock. The factory site is designed to have generous space, covered or not, for the cocoa beans to dry, which are then collected and processed for conching, mixing and cooking. All of these steps occur at the cooking room. They are then moved to the preparation room where they mold, and prepare the product for packaging. The finished product is then stored at the loading dock and is also utilized as dry and cold storage for the chocolate.
Along the service road is the Learning center, it can also be accessed by going up the steps from the paths from the visitor’s center and the factory. The learning center consists of classrooms, administration offices and a studio. The two classrooms are designed with a folding partition in the middle when retracted turns into one large classroom.
Similar across all the structures of the complex is how we used the local and indigenous material of thatch and bamboo as part of the exterior wall system that ties all the buildings together.
The experienced Kallari cooperative already teaches the Kichwa youth and the many families under their wing the practice of traditional harvesting, designing handicrafts, and producing organic chocolate for many years now. To deny this knowledge and their already successfully implemented system, would be unthinkable. So we embrace it.
