Photo: © Javier García

As part of a plan to promote biodiversity and protect the surrounding environment in the South American city of Cali. Colombia, the multi-use Host and Nectar Garden Building seeks to establish a network of gardeners and environmentally responsible citizens living in and around the complex.

Photo: Husos

Described as a “bioclimatic building,” the prototype building has a green facade that provides a microclimate within the building, reduces energy consumption, and a garden to attract insects and birds. It’s all part of an effort to create a network of “biological corridors.”  

Photo: © Manuel Salinas

Photo: © Manuel Salinas

A collaborative effort by Madrid-based Husos, a platform for the development of both spatial interventions and research projects in architecture and urbanism, the project involved the creation of gardens as well as activities to engage the community in understanding and protecting their natural environment.

Photo: © Javier García

Photo: © Manuel Salinas

Photo: © Taller Croquis

Gardeners planted a variety of native bushes and climbing plants designed to host and produce nectar for butterflies and create a habitat for birds and other local insect species.

Photo: © Taller Croquis

Butterflies are considered model organisms for studying the impacts of habitat loss and fragmentation resulting from climate change. They function as indicators of the health of the environment and ecosystem wherein this structure resides, a region that is host to one of the world’s greatest concentrations and diversity of butterflies.

Photo: © Taller Croquis

Developed in collaboration with biologists from the Cali zoo, the building and gardens offer an educational experience and a place to forge new bonds between the Caleños and their natural environment.

Photo: © Taller Croquis

Neighborhood children can participate in workshops, and visitors receive seeds and brochures to encourage them to plant gardens on their balconies, front yards, and patios.

Photo: © Manuel Salinas

From the Husos website: Husos is committed to the development of an architecture that is sensitive to the everyday, to the transformational capacity of small daily actions, to the empowerment of micro communities, to the possibilities of cooperation and exchange, to the beauty of diversity and singularity, to the constructive role of shared imaginations and affections and to the potentials of the unexpected. We employ an approach that is environmentally responsible, transdisciplinary and permeable.

h/t ArchDaily.