On Design Diplomacy in Afghanistan / Francisco Brown

Architecture Off-Centre

“Understand that your mission was the building… That at the end of the day, your politics or your own sense of values, might never meet the middle point, I sat down to negotiate the existence of our building, [otherwise] they will blow the whole thing up.”

In its efforts to build new infrastructure with foreign aid, Afghanistan, as a post-conflict nation, welcomed international organizations and assistance from other countries. Francisco Brown worked in Kabul for half a decade, designing and building schools, hospitals, police training academies and counter narcotics centres.

Francisco “Pancho” Brown is an architect, a creative consultant, and a journalist, with a background in humanitarian and commercial architecture and research. He was recently selected as the 2020 New Museum Ideas City Fellow and as a Fellow by the Latin Leadership Center at the Harvard Kennedy School. Pancho has worked as an International Architect for the United Nations International Organization for Migration in Kabul, Afghanistan, where he still consults independently.

To check out Francisco’s work: https://www.panchobrown.com/

And his practice: https://micropolitanstudio.com/work