Lakota Tiwahe Tipi Project

Advancing cultural architecture one tipi, one family at a time.

The goal of the Lakota Tiwahe( Family) Tipi(Place of dwelling) Project(LTTP) is to provide safe, affordable, and sustainable housing to residents on the underserved and impoverished areas located with in the Oceti Sakowin territories. A major portion of the project include sourcing local materials, local modular assembly of the Tipi structure, adequate strength in design to include a wind turbine or solar panels, minimal foundation within IBC specs to avoid excess concrete, and proper wall engineering design for efficient housing construction. Our over all goal is to bring a viable product built by the very people that live within the communities thus fostering economic and educational opportunities. With the renewable technologies of today we can start to educate our younger generations on the importance of conservation consciousness by promoting the worlds mission on global warming. This begins in the home so by re-identifying our living needs as  individuals and collectively as a Oceti Sakowin nation we can start to strategically plan the future. One step in the plan would be how we view the home our ancestors lived in, thrived in and honored as a "good Mother who took care of her children". A Legend is told of a vision describing this cultural architecture as a "magnificent structure"  giving way to LTTP's vision of re-introducing it back to the people. By comparison of a traditional tipi which was considered mobile,comfortable, and strong to LTTP's engineered design all approaches of efficiency to construct are considered in historical and present applications of available materials to the builders. With this in mind we can start to formulate our communities identity through traditional teachings on how the home provided an important role in a child's up bringing and to cultivate community change for the future.  

  The Lakota Tiwahe Tipi Project plan to build  a safe, healthy, affordable home to serve the housing needs on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation 

 Our cultural architecture home design along with the structural engineering technology will help improve the structures efficiency to construct.

 With this in mind we can start to evolve our technological living needs to fit  a peoples way of life, thus improving their communities.

  The technology to help run homes more efficient will be implementing a home energy plan that can be acquired through an energy audit 

  The data collected can help us focus on improving the performance and to reach net zero over time. This can be done on existing homes to accurately show the deficient areas and then proceed to fully weatherize.   

 The information collected we then can start to formulate a projection in future power consumption in new home construction and business development.       

  Our goal is to first build a team of individuals with diverse backgrounds in sustainable building and in cultural understanding. 

  The next step will be to establish a funding source to drive the wheel necessary to accomplish the projects overall goals.

  This includes the training of a start-up crew consisting of young adults, elderly aged members in the Tipi knowledge of the historical set-up and the Tipi of today

  Our most important goal is to construct a fully functional unit to serve the community housing need and sustainable job creation. 

  Our vision will be to educate the community on the steps in retrofitting their homes to help save the family money within the first year.

   LTTP will be focusing on building a viable product through our community construction work-force training program that can help expand our goals to build and repair homes.

  The overall vision within the next 3 years will be to have occupied Tipi homes fully functional on Oceti Sakowin owned lands .

  One highlight during my prototype build was being interviewed by CNN in the structure as our back drop. The interview took place at the time Trump was in his first 100 days as president and it was focused on the people of Pine Ridge trying to build a life in todays standards of living. It was titled the "The forgotten People" and it tells the stories we all face on our homelands.

  Our location in the community of Spotted Owl gives a base of operations to serve members locally and the surrounding communities. 

  The modular design gives us a economic opportunity to build a Tipi home constructed by the Lakota people which can help drive cost down over a period of time. We still have to take in the consideration of rising building material costs so by exploring our local resources and to utilize any surplus materials for construction can better our cost savings.   

  Our local community has some employment options available but it only serves the few that do qualify and who want to work but nothing for individuals with little to no construction back ground.

  With our Introduction to basic carpentry skills we giving him/her the tools to better serve their community as a potential leader and who can demonstrate the positive effects of self investment.  

  Lakota county has a growing population and an unemployment rate of about 70% to 80% and a housing crisis that underserves the communities demand on the Pine Ridge Indian reservation.

  We expect to be serving up to 6 people in the work force training program in basic carpentry with weekly bench marks of success through understanding modular construction.

  With secured investment in the next 3 years we can bring more services to the LTTP's work force training opportunity center expanding the community and customer base.

  Our revenue model for the Tipi homes at this point will be to build units that are a turn key product ready available for the customers with different living needs.

  This will help us be a more pro-active builder that can help better the spending of the peoples investment dollars on the reservation giving us room for growth, profitability, and expansion. 

 I'm applying to Solve in an effort to bring two worlds together to network  for a positive human effort in the fight to better our lives here and through out the world.

I believe Solve is a key component for the advancement of community development in the areas of technology that will help serve a bigger role in our conservation efforts.  

 One barrier is our economic situation that has not been stable enough to sustain a start-up business and the regulations the surround the financial resources to help generate communities.

  If we can start to build relations with outside institutions like Solve who have a vital role in building a sustainable path then we can do more together for the betterment of humanity.