Construction Pioneers. Building Innovation in Upland Northern Laos
Project Team:
Molly McGrath (PhD Researcher)
Dr. Rosalie Stolz (Principal Investigator)
International Affiliates:
Dr. Eli Elinoff (Victoria University Wellington, New Zealand)
Prof. Dr. Pierre Petit (Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium)
The Project in a Nutshell: How does newness enter the world?
This question entices us to observe the creative ways in which new phenomena, things and ideas are incorporated by agents into existing sociocultural frameworks. One area in which changes are particularly visible is the built environment. In Laos, uplanders, many of whom belong to ethnic minorities, are currently experimenting with cement as a new building material. In recent years, the built landscape in northwestern Laos has been changing drastically. Construction Pioneers is a Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft funded project, discussing the apparently simple question of how local house builders in Laos handle this new building material and transform the design and shape of houses.
Outputs and activities
Throughout the past few years of this project we have conducted long-term fieldwork in Northern Laos, convened international workshops such as Frontier Entanglements in Laos (May 2024) and The Future is Now (September 2025) among others.
Key outputs include the volumes Being Present (co-edited with Paul-David Lutz, Jan 2026), Houses Transformed (co-edited with Jonathan Alderman, 2024) and Stolz’s chapter on “Impermeability” in The Social Properties of Concrete (edited by Eli Elinoff and Kali Rubaii, 2025).