Luxury Zambian lodge selects Eva-Tech products for sustainable, low-impact construction
Chinzombo Lodge site is an ecologically sensitive region within a national wildlife conservation park, which required any construction to be environmentally friendly, minimise physical impact during construction and ensure longevity to prevent unnecessary future upgrades or maintenance.
PROJECT DETAILS
PROJECT CHALLENGE
The architect’s design brief was to create a fully sustainable, environmentally friendly group of identical villas and communal entertainment area for guests. Each villa was built to provide a 150m2 deck on which a bedroom, bathroom and partially covered outdoor relaxation area with a fibreglass pool would be placed.PROJECT SOLUTION
The lightweight structures of each villa and the communal entertainment facility were all constructed of steel, heavily treated pine trusses to raise the decking base off the ground and Eva-tech decking and fascia boards. The external walls and bathroom enclosures were created using both locally sourced grass, reeds and tent fabric, suspended from Klip-Lok roofing.Chinzombo Lodge villas and communal building were designed to be fully and easily dismantlable, leaving little to no impact on the area. Materials were specified to ensure longevity and durability to reduce future modifications, repairs and maintenance. Eva-tech’s environmentally friendly credentials and high durability performance ratings were the factors taken into account in selecting these materials.
Despite being exposed to all weather conditions and a high level of heat, rain and dust at certain times of the year, the Eva-tech natural timber finish requires only cleaning to maintain its appearance
RESULTS
In alignment with the lodge’s low-impact ethos, local residents were employed to complete assembly of the construction components which had been manufactured in South Africa and transported to Zambia. Without prior working experience with Eva-tech, under the guidance of a single foreman, the team of workers were able to complete each villa within five days
KEY INFLUENCER QUOTE
Since installation in 2012, the Eva-tech decking and fascia profiles have performed optimally in harmony with the surroundings.The client is very happy and we’ve used the same materials and techniques for various other lodges in Zambia and Madagascar – the only thing that has changed is the selection of aesthetic finishes to account for local environmental conditions. The Eva-tech profiles we used have been in place for nine years and are still going strong. – Alex Hardy, Bluegreen Ltd.
