A few kilometers from the confluence of the Rio Negro and the Amazon, Manaus was founded in 1669 and remained for a long time a small town in the middle of the Amazon rainforest until, at the end of the 19th century, it received an extraordinary boost thanks to the hevea brasiliensis, or rubber tree. The indispensable role that rubber took on in the Industrial Revolution, to the extent that it earned the nickname “white gold”, suddenly transformed this remote location into the thriving and populous “Paris of the Tropics”, one of the first Brazilian cities to receive electricity and home to the famous Amazonas theatre, whose construction condensed the finest craftsmanship and manufacturing excellence of the Old World. Today, having overcome the rubber fever, Manaus is still an important financial and cultural center of Brazil, with the largest river port in the Amazonian hydrographic system and an active fishing port. This flourishing economy, which also benefits from a thriving tourism industry, has been threatened by the terrible drought that has recently gripped the Amazon region, in addition to the harsh phenomena of deforestation and fires.

WISH set out to investigate the delicate balance of this urban “island” in the middle of the Amazon and to reflect – through the collective housing project – on the possibilities of continuing to inhabit this extraordinary ecosystem in the light of a renewed environmental sensitivity. Thanks to the exceptional contribution of Nama (Núcleo Arquitetura Moderna na Amazônia), which for years has been committed to understanding how contemporary architectural requirements can be dropped into the complex and delicate Amazonian equilibrium, fifteen project sites were identified – one for each student – helping us to understand and touch on the topical points of living in the rainforest: we explored local construction techniques, we understood the role of shade and of ground connection in the Amazonian reality, we reflected on the continuity between interior and exterior in relation to the specific climatic conditions of this place, we worked on the necessary “ductility” of architectural objects that have to cope with a seasonal excursion of the water level of the Rio Negro that can be as high as fourteen meters.