Be a part of something bigger
Design Sustainability Compassion
Design Cause
What We Do
Design Cause Inc., a registered nonprofit organization, works side-by-side with developing world communities to design and construct highly functional, highly sustainable, easily replicable public buildings. Combining the power of design and the human element that drives progress, our model builds lasting change by addressing a community’s greatest need and providing a new construction based skillset that can be used long after outside support has left.
Our Work
From our incorporation in 2016 we have completed two projects in two very different parts of the world. Our work has impacted the lives of hundred of students, their families, and had a profound effect on the communities we have worked in.
Our work is a celebration of the power of design, sustainability, and a community coming together to support their future through education.
Our Current Project
We are Going back to Thunga for our third project!
Thunga Library and Support Center
We are going back to Thunga for our third project! This project is focused on extending the impact of our work by providing urgently needed supporting structures. A support center will enable Thunga Primary School to recruit and hold better teachers and a library for Thunga Secondary School will provide the additional learning support that many of these students require in order to graduate.
To learn more about this project and how it benefit the community of Thunga visit the project page.
Consider making a donation to support Thunga Library and Support Center
Our Most Recently Completed Project
Thunga Primary School
Thunga is a small village in Southern Malawi where tea trees cover the landscape and warm smiles are everywhere you look. Just on the other side of the hill lies Thunga Primary School, the only primary school in the growing village of Thunga. The school was built in the 1960's and currently only has 10 classrooms for more than 1,350 students. The community is struggling to provide an education to all primary school age children because there simply isn't space for them in the overstuffed classrooms.
Design Cause committed to building a three classroom addition to alleviate the stress on the existing classrooms but we were so successful fundraising that we were able to expand our efforts into a four classroom addition, new latrines, and much needed repairs to the existing structures!
It took 3 months and hundreds of hours of hard labor but what we accomplished in Thunga is nothing short of outstanding. Learn more about everything we did in Thunga and the hundreds of students it will benefit on our project page.
Our Successfully Completed Inaugural Project
Saint Andrew's of Ngong
As the attendance of this secondary school in Northern Cameroon continued to rise more classrooms were necessary. Unfortunately, traditional public buildings create more problems than they solved. Design Cause found a solution for the community of Ngong in a classroom that is much cooler for students, uses local sustainable building materials, and used easily replicated construction methods, all at a much lower cost.
The design is simple yet innovative. The walls are built with soil stabilized bricks which are made from local soil, cement, and water. This new technology creates soil bricks which are as strong as concrete masonry units with a fraction of the environmental footprint. The large, operable windows give teachers and students the chance to fully open or close the classroom depending on ventilation needs. The design is simple yet effective.
The involvement of the local community, students, and faculty are what made this project truly successful. The structure was entirely locally made and all design decisions were decided between the founder of Design Cause, the principal of St. Andrew's, and our partnering Cameroonian architect and construction manager. This resulted in a structure that made the community proud of their work and the school excited to get into the new buildings that they were a part of creating.
Take a closer look at this successful project on our project page
Join the Cause
We are a small project based non-profit. That means that we have no continual overhead expenses resulting in 100% of all donations directly supporting our current project.
Like all non-profits, we rely exclusively on our wonderful base of donors to help us accomplish our projects and change lives. If you would like to be a part of our work please consider making a donation today.