ANZA #1: Making Our City
Prologue to ANZA #1:
“Architecture, although we often don’t realize it, always played a central role in our culture and life: in our homes, places of worship, offices, and shops. The 21st century has brought much social-economic transformation to Africa, and it has been coined as the century of the cities. The African continent will most probably experience immense population growth – the United Nations estimates that Africa’s population may more than triple in the century. Most of this growth will take place in cities – and in architecture.
Therefore, both specialists and public need to openly discuss the urban and architectural issues connected with these growing cities. But there is no platform in the form of a magazine for such a discussion. ANZA is edited in Dar es Salaam, Africa’s fastest growing city. It is to be a vehicle for open criticism and a constructive exchange of opinions; a platform to launch innovation solutions; a place for the discussion of typical local phenomena, and as a source of information for decision makers.
To kick-start the magazine, a four-week workshop was setup by Camenzind Magazine, Zurich to train a group of young ambitious and vibrant university students and recent graduates to form a future editorial team for a magazine that will fill the void of an East-African architectural magazine. The workshop included training in text writing and editing, photography, art and production, and finally marketing and strategy to ensure the long-term existence of the magazine.
After a fun and loud discussion bouncing ideas back and forth, we finally came up with the magazine title: ANZA, a Swahili word meaning, “start.” We found this name suitable as it marks both the beginning journey of this East-African architectural magazine and the long journey of our hopeful East-African cities and their peoples. Aside from this name being subtly powerful, we all agreed that it was also typographically beautiful.
One may ask: “can a diverse multidisciplinary student-published magazine, dealing with issues concerning people and spaces, issued bi-annually, compete with newer, more interactive, and above all faster formats like blogs and online forums?” Answer: one can never know unless they ANZA!”
24 pages
Prologue / Editorial in Swahili and English
Articles in English
D 5€
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