“In September 2017, central Mexico was severely affected by a magnitude 7.1 earthquake that destroyed a significant portion of the architectural heritage built with adobe and other traditional construction techniques.
The reconstruction strategy implemented by the Mexican government was carried out on an individual, household-by-household basis, through bank cards loaded with insufficient financial resources and redeemable exclusively at suppliers of industrialized building materials. This approach, compounded by the widespread dissemination of misinformation regarding the alleged structural vulnerability of traditional materials such as adobe, led entire communities to drastically transform their physical appearance within a short period of time.
This was the case in San Simón el Alto, a settlement in the municipality of Malinalco, State of Mexico.
Between 2017 and 2020, a collaboration composed of the author of this document*, Tatiana Bilbao ESTUDIO, Fundación Comunitaria Malinalco, and Universidad Iberoamericana accompanied 43 families throughout the extended process of rebuilding and self-constructing their homes in the aftermath of the earthquake.”
- Percibald Garcia
"Participatory processes in housing production hold fundamental importance. The amalgamation of local knowledge among residents and the interdisciplinary collaboration are essential to the project."
- Tatiana Bilbao
Percibald isn’t just one of the nicest people I've ever met. He’s an architect, but foremost, he is a social activist who has spent years on this project. Consequently, he was extremely passionate about the families involved and creating new homes within the dwellings.
As with our first encounter in Tlatelolco, his passion was infectious, and I wanted to see in person what had been achieved.
He arranged for a car and took me to San Simón.