African Thatched Hut Model

This project is a fun and exciting model that anyone from a budding architect to a craft lover can jump on. Thatched huts are locally constructed structures that have their roofs covered with straws or a similar material. Very common in rural settlements of African countries, the bodies of these huts are built from palm branches, wood or clay and their roofs covered with straw or palm branches. In modern times, people still make craft huts as an outdoor sit out areas, with some planks and a thatch roof.

Ways you can use your Thatch Hut Model

1. Concept drawing for a proposed building model
2. Display it at an art exhibition and put a good price tag to it.
3. Put it up in a museum
4. Use it as a home décor piece.
5. Give it to your African friend as a gift!

For this Project I used

1. Cardboard
2. Glue
3. Tape
4. Pencil/Pen for marking
5. Cutting tool
6. Ruler
7. Tree Branches
8. Flat surface for cutting

Mark out required dimension on your cardboard with your pencil or pen.

• One large square for the base
• A rectangle for the body of the hut
• Cardboard Strips for roof framework (about 8 strips required)
• Roofing Sheet Strips (about 30 strips required)

Carefully cut out your pieces from the marked out Dimensions with your cutting tool/scissors (If you're a child please ensure you have an adult to supervise with cutting out)

A guide for dimensions you can make use :

Square Base - (40cm x 40cm)

Hut Body - (60cm x 30cm)

Framework Sheets - (24cm x 6cm)

Roofing Sheets - (50cm x 1cm)

We'll be laying out a base and body for our hut

Guide

• Set the square base on the flat surface you're using
• Roll the large rectangle into a cylinder, with the longer side as the circumference of the cylinder and the shorter sides as the height.

DO NOT PUT GLUE ON THE CYLINDER YET TO SEAL

• You can instead use a bit of tape to hold it temporarily in place.
• Centralize your cylinder on the base and then mark out areas in front and at the sides for the door and windows.
• Now take your cylinder off the base, remove the tape and flatten the cylinder back to a rectangle
• With your marked lines as references draw well defined straight boxes using your ruler and pencil for the door hole in front and windows.
• Carve out these boxes you drew carefully with your cutting tool to get the spaces for door entrance and window panes for the hut.
• Fold the rectangle back again into a cylinder and place it centrally on the base.
• Now you can put glue to seal the ends of the cylinder together, but do not seal the cylinder to the base yet.

In this step we have to make a framework for the thatch roof to be laid on.

We initially cut out two sets of strips, the wider of the two is what we would be using in this step. You can choose to cut out a larger number of strips, I used about 8 fat strips.

Guide

• Put glue on one of the shorter edges of the strips and then carefully attach it to the inner side of the hut body.
• Do this for each of the strips and evenly space them round the cylinder's circumference.
• When you've attached all the strips to the Hut's body, bend about 2cm from each of the free ends of the strip to meet at it's center
• Put some glue to seal the free ends together at the center and use tape to strengthen the joint.

This step shows how to place our cardboard thatch on the roof framework.

GUIDE

• Take a thinly cut piece of thatch and put glue on it up till about 2cm of the length
• Attach this piece to the roof framework and allow the edge that doesn't have glue to hang freely at the lower edge of the framework.
• Do this for all the thatch strips, until you've covered the entire roof framework all round.
• Cover up the roof top with shorter strips of thatch until no space is left to fill in with thatch.

In this stage we put every loose piece in final place!

• Now glue the bottom of your hut to your base carefully.
• Ensure your hut is placed exactly where you want it on the base and then make a mark round it.
• Put some glue round the base and attach it to the marked out base.
• Carefully carve out a hole small enough to fit your tree branches and place them in the holes.
• Use some glue to ensure it's fixed firmly.
• Allow everything to dry.

Take a step back and please admire the beautifully crafted work of art you just made!