Construction Progresses on the Three Projects of the 18th Latin American Social Workshop in Colombia

Read the original version in Spanish here.

Published on July 07, 2026

Twenty years after its first edition in Colombia, the Latin American Social Workshop returns to the South American country. In this edition, students from across Latin America, alongside architects from Colombia, Ecuador, and Chile, are intervening in three areas in the coffee-growing city of Manizales: a rural settlement in the middle of the mountain range, a self-managed park, and the slopes of an informal pedestrian neighborhood.

Here, we invite you to explore the progress made by the architectural teams participating in the 18th Latin American Social Workshop (TSL XVIII) in Manizales.

Bajo Andes Workshop: Bicistema (Colombia) + República Portátil (Chile)

Surrounding the ravines of Manizales, the residential neighborhood of Bajo Andes is home mainly to families and people forcibly displaced by violence, alongside former combatants and migrants. Due to the informal nature of the area, they live in self-built, overcrowded housing amidst narrow staircases and pedestrian labyrinths.

Supported by the Fundación de Cultura Viva, the team of students and architects led by Laura Rojas and Diego Cárdenas of Bicistema, alongside Mauricio and Andrés Moreno of República Portátil, is working in this sector. They are intervening in a soccer field and its improvised stands to transform them into a community space that includes a playground, a vertical garden built around *guadua* (bamboo) structures, and tactical urbanism interventions on the field. "We are working in a community facing a very harsh reality, so providing a play space for the children will offer them a living classroom opportunity," says Laura Rojas in conversation with ArchDaily.

With three days left until the scheduled completion, the garden structures have been anchored, the framework reinforced, the ground leveled, and the foundations for the structures installed. Meanwhile, the team in charge of the garden has begun bringing in plants and crafting *guadua* planters, while a painting team is working on a geometric design to paint the court in the coming days.

Manzanares Workshop: Ruta 4 (Colombia) + La Cabina de la Curiosidad (Ecuador)

Nestled between coffee plantations and tropical forests in the Cordillera Central, the village of Manzanares centers around a narrow dirt road, where public life unfolds outdoors. Here, architects Juliana López Marulanda and Marie Combette lead an eminently rural workshop, reached after a one-hour bus ride from Manizales followed by a one-hour walk from the highway.

Following discussions with the community, neighborhood leaders requested an intervention on the local community hall. "We discovered that this is not just a single-point intervention; rather, we need to identify potential sites so that the community can develop future projects on its own," explains Juliana López Marulanda.

Marie Combette explains that "every house has its balcony, its long corridor, its bench to get some fresh air, have lunch, socialize, or wait, but the community hall turns its back on the town." Consequently, the workshop chose to renovate the facade and activate the community center's outdoor space, allowing it to be used without needing keys to unlock the building.

Currently, students and architects are laying the foundations for the *guadua* poles that will serve as pillars for a terrace outside the community center, alongside a small vegetable garden and an outdoor cooking area.

San José Workshop: Lucía Garzón (Colombia) + Coonvite (Colombia) + República Portátil (Chile)

Conceived to transform 110 hectares in downtown Manizales, the San José Macro-project involved the expropriation of hundreds of downtown homes. Although the project, announced in 2009, has yet to be completed, residents refer to it as a *Macro-disaster*. One of the expropriated lots is now home to Parque Urbitante, a park created and managed by the social organization Comunativa. This is where the workshop led by architect Lucía Garzón, alongside architects Juan Miguel Durán (Coonvite) and Julio Suárez and Luis Felipe Maureira of República Portátil, is currently working.

Speaking with ArchDaily, Julio Suárez explains that the project is designed in rings. Students and workshop participants are building an intervention they call the Bahareque Museum. A second ring comprises the green areas of Parque Urbitante, where the workshop is designing and fabricating "micro-architecture" consisting of pathways and mobile furniture. Meanwhile, the central project is the Aula Urbitante: a 6-meter-tall conical *guadua* structure where Coonvite can hold its gatherings around a fire pit.

At this stage, the workshop has already installed the foundations and rafters of the Aula Urbitante, which is enveloped by "petals" made of *guadua* split-cane roof panels woven with wire. The structure is crowned by a metal ring to vent the classroom's fire pit.