EWAP Grants 2024, a roundup of the year!

2024 has been our busiest and most exciting year so far! 

Location of EWAP Grants

Our first year small grants have all completed their projects and several second year small grants too. These projects provide a record of wooden structures that are endangered because of neglect, conflict or environmental circumstances. Documentation may involve a combination of methods, such as digital outputs (images generated by point cloud, photogrammetric images, scaled ortho-images, 3D models), drawings (sketches, measured, technical), plans, sections and elevations, photographs, videos, maps, oral histories and other forms of written documentation. 

See the list below for the links to these projects in our Arches database.

• Afloat for Centuries: The Flat-bottomed Indus Boats 
• The houses of Japanese immigrants in the Atlantic Forest in Brazil
• Conical Stick Houses of the Hamer Tribe, Ethiopia
• Te Whare Mīmiro – documenting the endangered post-tensioned Māori meeting house
• Documentation of Himalayan wooden architecture in Tamang Heritage trail (Nepal)
• Disappearing Log-Houses of the Gurez Valley in Kashmir
• Burmese Teak Farmhouse Documentation Project
• Documenting Endangered Wooden Architecture of Colonial "Lagos" Railway Infrastructure in Ebute-Meta Railway Compound

Otitooluwa, T (2023). Images, Building elevations and features, Jaekel House | EWAP2031SG-STA-0001. Ebute-Meta Railway Compound (Nigeria) collection. Endangered Wooden Architecture Programme. https://doi.org/10.60491/ewap2031sg102024001

Some of our projects have also created videos explaining why their buildings are important or the methods they have employed to record them.

Burmese Teak Farmhouse Documentation Project (World Monuments Fund)

Wooden Havelis of Gujarat, India (CEPT)

We are also excited to present 22 new EWAP projects! 

As in previous years, competition was very high, with many outstanding applications from across the globe. After a rigorous review process EWAP awarded nine Medium Grants (up to £80,000 over 18 months) and thirteen small grants (up to £30,000 over 12 months). 

It is encouraging to see so many applications responding to the need to safeguard these endangered wooden structures. All our projects aim to promote local collaboration, communication and respect and we look forward to watching them progress through the coming years. 

Here is a list of this year’s successful projects (read more about them here)

• Vernacular Architecture in Tuvalu
• Documentation of Endangered Islamic Architecture in Post Disaster Aceh
• Historic Wooden Temples of Uttarakhand, India
• Guardians of the Forest: Recording Ukraine's Wooden Churches
• Batule Ghar -Round Houses of mid hills of Nepal
• Preserving Levuka town, Fiji
• Wajãpi Wooden Architecture: a building tradition of an Amazonian indigenous group
• Saving Western Ukraine's Wooden Buildings
• Survey of Vernacular Architecture along Bulgarian-Serbian border
• Heritage in Timber: Documenting the Bocco House in Old Calabar.
• The Ancient Wooden Tower houses of Western Uttarakhand, India
• The Cator and Cribbage Wooden architecture of Indian Baltistan, Ladakh (India)
• The trojes building culture from the purépecha highlands of Michoacan, Mexico
• Documenting the architecture of indigenous nomads’ homes (Kapar) in southern regions of Iran
• Vunisei and Saione Motu'a: Endangered wooden Fijian and Tongan iconic buildings
• Kath Kuni: A vanishing style at Kullu, India
• Documenting and Digitalizing The Traditional Malay Kutai House of Perak
• Documenting Endangered Wooden Agriculture Architecture in West Sumatra  
• Documentation of Wooden Architecture in World Heritage Istanbul, Zeyrek
• Vernacular Malay Houses in Indonesia: Preserving the Endangered Heritage
• Historic residential wooden architecture in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
• Documenting Endangered Wooden Architecture of Desa Manlima, Kamanasa District, Malaka Regency, East Nusa Tenggara, Timor, Indonesia

Traditional Wooden Architecture in Zeyrek,
İstanbul © Demet Binan, 2024

These projects bring our total up to 50 projects recording 779 endangered wooden buildings around the world!

The Endangered Wooden Architecture Programme (EWAP) is a cultural grants programme established in 2021 with funding from Arcadia, a charitable foundation that works to protect nature, preserve cultural heritage and promote open access to knowledge.