The Architectural History of Postcolonial West African Universities
Adefola Toye is a PhD student at the University of Liverpool, co-supervised with The National Archives through a Collaborative Doctoral Partnership scheme. Her research examines university architecture in mid-twentieth-century Nigeria, tracing how campus design and construction shifted as political control transferred from colonial to independent governments.
The post-war period saw a wave of university building across British West Africa, funded through Colonial Development and Welfare Acts and overseen by the Inter-University Council for Higher Education in the Colonies. University College Ibadan, designed by Maxwell Fry and Jane Drew, is the most widely studied example. But Adefola’s research moves beyond Ibadan to less well-known institutions: the Nigerian College of Art, Science and Technology (1951) and the four universities established immediately after independence in 1960, including Ahmadu Bello University, Obafemi Awolowo University, and the University of Lagos.
In this post for The National Archives, Adefola discusses how she has used colonial records at Kew to study these institutions and their built environments. She also addresses a problem central to any archival study of this period. As independence approached, British oversight diminished and documentation thinned out. The Colonial Office files become sparser, and the story can only be reconstructed by working across multiple archives and geographies, from the National Archives of Nigeria to the Bodleian Library in Oxford and Michigan State University. Her argument is clear: no single archive can sustain a full account of how these campuses were planned, negotiated, and built. The research demands a multi-archival and transnational approach.
Congratulations to Adefola on successfully defending her PhD on 8th May 2026.
We returned to Accra to take down the Kingsway Stores exhibition. It’s currently in storage at the emerging and wonderful Si Hene Foundation. The future of the exhibition is quite exciting – the details are still being resolved, but it’s certainly going to travel around Ghana and onto Nigeria (details to follow – and we’ll post updates here). Si Hene has it’s own collection of Kingsway archive material too – so it’s the ideal spot. The exhibition was dismantled and transported on the motorbike-truck.
I gave a talk to the archivist-curator-artists at Si Hene on our work, methods, practice and community engagement. This was great fun and the quality of the projects being produced here is astonishing.
After dismantling the exhibition there was time to search out some new, old, and modified structures. First on the list was the School of Law from 1959. Designed by Zdzisław Borysowicz of Nickson and Borys. I came across an archival image of the building in the Borys archives – and was eager to visit…
The kind people at the School allowed us to explore and take some photos.
Check out the curved brise soleil – how was this cast with such accuracy? It’s a similar size and proportion to the nearby Library also designed by Borys – but this time curved. This would involve some very tricky and geometrically complex formwork and there doesn’t appear to be a climatic/comfort reason for doing so? There was also the usual terrazzo and concrete with crustacean aggregate – all carefully finished. The most dramatic part of the design is the zig-zag concrete solar shading. This is projecting from the main facade – and appears to hang, unsupported. It’s audacious and brave. There’s new glazing been added behind, but the overall effect is just about retained… The brise Soleil features on the south and north facing facades – was tropical modernism becoming more of a ’style’ than a pragmatic solution by this stage?
Borys designed some of the finest buildings in West Africa. In Accra alone this includes the library, Padmore Memorial Library, PRAAD, Court extension, the law school – and as we went onto see, some excellent housing too.
There’s a fascinating villa in the Borys archive. It’s a house for “Mr and Mrs Pepera, Accra, Ghana”. Pepera was an industrialist and business owner and his family owned some large plots of land across the city. He commissioned Borys to design a house on Switchback Road in Accra. One of the facades contains a distinct mosaic mural. With the help of Allotey Bruce Konuah the family told us that the house had been redeveloped, but the mural survived. We went to take a look. It seems that the house has been rebuilt in a similar style and the mural has either been remade, or possibly partially preserved.
There’s a few other interesting dwellings on the same stretch of Switchback Road – how long they’ll remain isn’t certain – the land value and rapid development is forcing vast highrise construction here and these villas set within large landscaped gardens are at risk.
There are some smaller clinics and hospitals along this road too, with accompanying residences.
The new @adjayeassociates offices opened earlier this month in Accra. It’s an impressive structure with generous interior and exterior spaces for exchanges, meetings, displays, and studios. The gallery contains some of the most beautiful and carefully crafted models we’ve seen.
Stabilised rammed earth (swishcrete) features heavily on the exterior – mirroring the marble clad vertical fins and approach of Lasdun’s Takoradi bank . The most startling aspect of the design is the decision to raise the structure up from the ground level. The structural span is vast and courageous, with the entirely building appearing to perch on a large round concrete drum form at one end (it’s a kind of inhabitable piloti containing a fire escape). It’s quite an unusual gesture to only use as a means of escape.
The structural solution is impressive – but it left me wondering why was it done? Is it referencing the modernist piloti concept, or the colonial bungalow model, or perhaps the former US embassy in Accra ? The underpass could make for a great outside studio, exhibition space, or a spot for a planted garden and evaporation pool – but it’s only used to provide shade for parked cars at the moment… Perhaps the landscaping and activation of the space will follow – it takes time to bed into a space like this – and the roof garden and kitchen makes up for it with views to the ocean and across the city.
Going back to the ‘rammed earth’ – it would be good to know the cement content. Are we really dealing with a pigmented concrete solution here rather than adobe ?
Very grateful @phelim_owusu for kindly giving us a tour and to @k_of_i for organising the visit.
Finally a visit to the Danish embassy – a villa set in gardens in North Ridge. Architect unknown – but a careful design that blended the garden and interiors – perfect setting for the art exhibition, performance, and gathering.
“Join us to celebrate the launch of a major digital platform which makes available over 4000 archival drawings, photographs and documents related to the AA’s Department of Tropical Architecture (1954–71) – a programme attended by a generation of architects and planners who would help to shape practice across the Global South. The platform maps the careers, experiences and legacies of over 550 alumni, across 82 countries – foregrounding previously hidden histories and revealing the transnational relationships and networks of practices, institutions and government bodies which interacted with and informed the pedagogy of the Department.
Students at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, constructing geodesic dome, 1964. Photograph: AA Archives
This project was generously supported by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts.”
An interesting image of the Dome being built in Kumasi from 1964 above – a number of these were constructed in the 1950s and 1960s (and one was shown at the V&A Tropical Modernism exhibition too). It reminded me of the photo taken by Michael Hirst (also an AA Department of Tropical Architecture graduate) of the dome built by Fuller in Accra…
Image courtesy of Michael Hirst, 1958, Buckminster Fuller Dome built in front of Accra’s Law Courts, Ghana.
Our new monograph on the city of Freetown, Sierra Leone has (finally) been published – open access and you can download it here. It’s a major output stretching to 240 pages across a chunky 250x250mm format and is the third book in our series on sharing the archives of the United Africa Company. The other two books are on Kingsway Stores and The Photocard collection.
Photocard and Kingsway catalogue
Our approach in Freetown was to identify and write brief historical narratives on the city’s development using archival photographs mainly from the Unilever UAC collection, alongside recent photographs. Archival work took place at Unilever, Bodlean Library, UK National Archives, as well as at Fourah Bay in Freetown – and this informed our fieldwork and photography. The approach is a classic ‘before and after’ set of images with descriptions. There isn’t an architectural guide book or detailed study of Freetown and it’s architecture – which is quite shocking considering the quality of the work and the architects involved (including Nickson and Borys; Jame Cubitt; Ronald Ward and many others….)
Freetown An Architectural Gazetteer
As well as covering the major buildings in the city we include an extended essay on Fourah Bay College, and a write up on Bonthe at Sherbro that we were fortunate to visit. We’re particularly proud of the Bonthe work – and there is certainly a lot more research to undertake into its history and architecture.
Have a listen to Rixt Woudstra and Ewan Harrison talking more about how we researched, made, and designed our latest book ‘Architecture, Empire and Trade‘ on the New Books in Architecture podcast series…. Thank you to Matthew Wells for hosting the podcast and for the super questions and comments.
An Account of the Tamil Nadu State Archives in Chennai: Searching, Finding & Adapting
By Kunal Mathur, PhD candidate, University of Liverpool , K.Mathur2@liverpool.ac.uk
In July 2025, I did fieldwork for a PhD in Architectural History at the Tamil Nadu State Archives in Chennai (previously known as Madras), India. I spent the whole month at the archive asking for and receiving documents. I came prepared with research on the archive and its documents, and with the added advantages of being Indian and having friends living in the city, I felt fairly confident. Having visited the archives at the British Library and the Wellcome Library in London, navigating archives were now familiar to me, or so I thought. My experience at the Tamil Nadu State Archives was anything but familiar. My preparations did help to an extent but for the most part, I had to figure things out for myself.
This article talks about the many hurdles I faced and how I overcame them. More often than not, I did not manage to overcome these hurdles and had to compromise or find alternate approaches.
My research follows the Madras General Hospital during a period of British rule in the country (1772-1862). All the documents I discuss will be restricted by the timeline stated but some of the hurdles I faced will apply to most students and academics. My hope is that my experiences at the Tamil Nadu State Archive will ultimately help others navigate the archives more productively.
Context
The Tamil Nadu State Archives, originally called the Madras Record Office, started in 1909. It houses government documents of the state and is a repository for historic documents of South India from the 17th century.
Figure 1: Tamil Nadu State Archives (Source: Archives Website)
The archive building is an impressive heritage structure constructed in the Indo-Saracenic style of architecture. During my visit in July 2025, restoration and renovation work was ongoing mainly in the interior spaces. The restoration of the facade had already been completed by then, only the scaffolding remained for the next few days of my visit.
Figure 2: Interior Work Underway (Source: Self)
The Tamil Nadu Archives Library remains a separate building somewhat behind the archive itself. Accessing the library was especially tricky, as you had to go through the archive to get to the library building. Newcomers to the archive could easily miss spotting or even realising that a library exists there. On the recommendation of the archivists, I visited the library first, as it contained indexes and guides to help navigate archival records. These indexes were unfortunately almost completely outdated. Additionally, the library kept completed dissertations, rare publications, old books, and journals for students to skim for references and clues to the archival documents. While I did not find any reference that benefitted my research, the dissertations covered many topics pertaining to the state and country and should not be skipped.
As mentioned earlier, my research follows the architectural history of the Madras General Hospital (1772-1862) as it grew and adapted to the city. Hence, I will be discussing my experience navigating the collection, Records of the East India company from 1670 to 1857. This collection, referred to as stacks, is one of the nine collections available at the archive. I will not delve too deeply into the subcollections as I did not manage to look at all of them.
Finding the Documents
On entry, students and academics are led to the Research Reading Room where they must find documentation. They are directed to one of two desktop computers that have the necessary indexes of each collection.
Figure 3: Sample of an Index (Source Archive’s Website)Figure 4 : Volumes with Manuscripts
The Desktop computers include a collection called ‘Press List’ (a great place to start) that serves as a variation of indexes for the collection on the East India Trading Company. The Press List is an invaluable source of information as it provides single sentence summaries or more of each communication, covering the period from 1750-1805. Discussions over a long period of time can be ascertained with reasonable detail through the Press List, serving as a source of information while being an index for other subcollections.
The Press List also serves as an index directing a researcher to a particular subcollection where details can be found. The subcollections for my research come under the Public and Military departments (for eg. Military Consultations or Public Consultations). A special serial/volume number is allotted to each document of the subcollections that can be retrieved from the S7 Catalogue (on the basis of the date). The documents cover a period of a few months to a year (varying as per collection and time period).
Figure 5: Manuscripts from Public Works Department
The Press List only covers the period up till 1805, leaving a large gap between 1806-1862. Some records of this later period are available through other indexes like the Public Works Department, Public department and the Military department, but they are too extensive to go through. The best way to find documents for this period would be to find dates through one’s own secondary research. The S7 Catalogue provides the necessary serial/volume number based on the date. For the documents after 1858, indexes like the Public Works Department, Public department and the Military department can be used to pinpoint the years and serial/volume number without the need for a catalogue.
After finding the date ranges and specific serial/volume numbers of documents, you will be allowed to submit a total of 10 document request per day. These requests are to be written down on a form and given to the archivists.
Challenges faced and Solutions Suggested
The archivists have difficulty in communicating in English, leading to miscommunications. Their common tongue, Tamil, is a regional language that is not known in most parts of India. The official language of the country, Hindi, is also not known to them, making it difficult for other Indians to communicate with them too. This poses a bigger problem in the initial phases when a researcher is trying to understand and navigate the archival collections. The best way to cope with this issue is to ask help from Tamil students in the research reading room. They can effectively translate for you, since most of them are fluent in English.
The archivists have difficulty reading English too, often leading to the procurement of the wrong archival documents. They misread words but understand numbers. Writing clearly and in bold letters is a good way of dealing with the problem. Moreover, writing the dates in a numerical format (dd-mm-yy) removes any chance of misreading the dates.
Many of the documents are missing and cannot be retrieved. Public and Military documents between 1858-1947 have not been maintained or preserved. Most of them are not available. From my experience, even the documents that are found have missing drawings and sketches. The documents before 1858 are undergoing the process of preservation. Documents of the Public Department are mostly available, but the military ones are not all available.
In my experience, more than half of the documents requested are not found. The best course of action is to search other subcollections of the public or military during the same time period. Many topics one may not find in one subcollection, maybe found in another. In my experience, abstracts, letters to England, and letters from England (subcollections) are good sources of information, as many conversations are repeated in them.
Conclusion
The Tamil Nadu State Archives has a variety of documents, maps, letters, manuscripts and books worth exploring. The building itself is impressive, especially when compared to other archival buildings in India. Staff members and archivists are welcoming and helpful, making daily visits to the archives more enjoyable and worthwhile. Overcoming the communication barrier with the staff and archivists can be seen as a constant hinderance and a major drawback of the archive, but it can be overcome over time.
The real issue at the archive is the availability and condition of the archival documents. Working around this issue takes time and patience. An explanation for a missing document varies from one staff member to the other and can often be frustrating. Finding solutions to these problems takes a significant amount of time, as it usually involves looking at other indexes and subcollections. Ascertaining substitute documents in other subcollections requires logical reasoning and significant background knowledge on the time period and functioning government. While finding information at the Tamil Nadu State Archive does seem like solving a puzzle, researchers like me do end up finding enough material.
I’ve been visiting buildings in Accra that I don’t know much about today.
SSMIT Pension House: super bit of brutalism near the ministries. This building looks after the state pensions – but who designed it? Perhaps a forgotten Nickson & Borys? Rather nice open staircase and precise brise soleil…. I can’t find any references to it in my collections or at the RIBA library catalogue. I’ll have to check WABA Journal again, but don’t recall ever reading about this significant building?
Accra Technical Institute. My reliable sources say it’s designed by none other than James Cubitt. Could be – it resembles his early work at KNUST, Kumasi. OR should I have gone to the Accra Technical College? But the dates for that institution don’t seem to add up.
Then there’s a delightful commercial building in Jamestown. It resembles the UAC Kingsway Store in Sekondi. It definitely wasn’t a Kingsway, but perhaps was linked to the UAC?
Finally “Betty House”. A rather large house in what was a prestigious neighbourhood in Jamestown at Korle Wokon. Historically important as the residence of Nana Akufo-Addo’s father and served as HQ for Ghana’s first political party, the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) after its formation in 1947.
Bringing the Kingsway Stores Home: Our Exhibition Opens in Accra15 Jan – Easter
On 15th January, we celebrated the opening of “Shopping Emporiums of West Africa: The Kingsway Stores” at Jamestown Cafe and Gallery in Accra, marking a significant milestone in our ongoing research into the architectural and commercial legacy of the United Africa Company. The launch evening brought together an engaged audience including President of the Ghana Institute of Architects Tony Asare, Dr Abena Busia, and Ronnie Micallef, the incoming High Commissioner of Malta in Accra, for what proved to be a thought-provoking discussion about retail modernism, colonial commerce, and architectural heritage in West Africa. David Kojo Derban gave a wonderful opening talk to contextualise the exhibition, along with a wider welcome from cafe and gallery owner architect Joe Owusu Addo.
The exhibition represents the culmination of over 5 years of collaborative research examining the Kingsway department store chain, which operated across West Africa throughout much of the twentieth century. Working alongside Unilever archivist Claire Tunstall and colleagues Ewan Harrison, Rixt Woudstra, Paul Robinson, and Michele Tenzon, we’ve traced the fascinating story of these iconic shopping emporiums from their inception through the independence periods of West Africa and beyond.
This work forms part of our broader investigation into the United Africa Company, published last year by Bloomsbury as “Architecture, Empire, Trade.” In our recent Journal of Design History article, co-authored with Ewan Harrison, Irene Appeaning Addo, and Oluwaseun Muraina, we wrote that “Kingsway responded to independence by instrumentalizing a particularly modernist domesticity through a series of didactic marketing efforts and the construction of boldly modernist new stores.” The article reveals how these stores weren’t simply places of commerce but architectural statements where “modernism is here revealed as complexly imbricated with colonial and neocolonial profit-seeking.”
The exhibition itself has journeyed from Liverpool to Ghana, carefully packed and stored at Jamestown Cafe before being installed in early January. Two freestanding pavilions display archival photographs from the Unilever Archive, accompanied by newly commissioned 3D-printed models created by Liverpool School of Architecture students and archival films that bring the stores’ bustling atmosphere to life. The pavilions themselves, fabricated using CNC routers by our expert technical team at Liverpool lead by James Galliford, echo the modernist architectural language of the stores they document.
What makes presenting this exhibition in Accra particularly meaningful is the opportunity to share this research in the very city where the first Kingsway store stood. The ruins stand next door to the gallery – a poignant reminder of this commercial and architectural heritage. Through collaboration with Allotey Bruce Konuah, we’ve extended the exhibition beyond the gallery walls with vinyl street banners installed on both the gallery exterior, creating a dialogue between past and present. The banners also contain QR codes so visitors and passers-by can freely download the catalogue.
Our commitment to sharing this research extends beyond this single exhibition. We were interviewed on Asaase Radio morning show and it was great to share our work with a broader audience across Ghana. Following the exhibitions run in Accra through to Easter, we hope to tour the exhibition to other venues, continuing the conversation about how retail modernism, colonial commerce, and architectural heritage intersect. This exhibition reminds us that architecture is never merely about buildings; it’s about the economic, social, and political systems that produce them.
The two major projects under construction in the city that we reported on in 2022 – Cathedral and Marine Drive have both stalled, and both projects are now under-review and reassessment – leaving behind faded hoardings and large vacant sites. At least the Community Centre and Ghana Club have some reprieve.
I also visited the Rex Cinema and Opera Cinema – both still looking excellent with their small scale intriguing entrance portals hiding their vast open-air screening areas.
The Kingsway Exhibition has been sent to Accra and carefully stored at the Jamestown Cafe for a few months now. We were finally able to unpack the vast pallet on Friday morning and spent the weekend constructing the two pavilions and installing the light boxes and panels.
The exhibition is being extended and reimagined through a further collaboration with Allotey Bruce Konuah on a series of vinyl street banners that will be installed on the exterior walls of the gallery space, as well as on the old ruined Kingsway Stores portico located next door.
The opening night is 15th January and all welcome. The exhibition will remain until Easter before it moves on…
Thank you to James Galliford and the Liverpool School of Architecture Technical Team for their expertise on the fabrication and installation, and to Claire Tunstall and Unilever Archives team for all their help and support sourcing the images and visuals.
Transnational Architecture Group 