There is a burgeoning, perhaps overdue, interest in mid-twentieth-century African architecture of the Modern Movement. This period saw independence movements and new self-ruling governments asserting their new nationhood with built projects, often in what was regarded as the International Style or Tropical Modernism, both offshoots of Modernism. These included monuments, convention centers, and hotels, with well-known examples such as the refined brutalism of the Kenyatta International Convention Center in Nairobi, Kenya, or the formal expressionism of the Dakar International Fair, Senegal.
It was also a time when universities were expanded and new ones established, requiring new state-of-the-art buildings and even entire campus masterplans. Several of these included new architecture schools, a new discipline in some countries. Aside from the well-published schemes, two small campus buildings on the edge of architectural discourse illustrate how the Modern Movement became deeply embedded in architectural education and practice in their respective countries. Both were designed by educators in the field who laid the foundations for generations of homegrown architects. These would go on to flourish in a profession that was initially dominated by foreigners, usually from Europe, and keep Modern Movement principles alive in the continent well into the 1980s and beyond.
