The Dien Ban Disability Day Centre is a proposed health and educational facility that the Kianh Foundation plans to build in 2010 in order to meet pressing needs for disability support and services in Dien Ban/Hoi An, Central Vietnam. Architects Without Frontiers are working with pro-bono firm, BURO Architecture, from Melbourne, RMIT University, RMIT International University Vietnam (RIUV) to develop concept designs for the 1600m2 facility.

The Kianh Foundation is a UK charity that has been helping disabled and disadvantaged children at the government-owned Hoi An Orphanage in Hoi An since 2002. It hopes to expand its work by building a separate, purpose designed facility in Dien Ban, located 8km from Hoi An. Dien Ban was heavily bombed during the war and has the highest proportion of disability in the Province, with over 800 children with disability who do not have access to essential education and therapy services.

The Disability Day Centre will help to address the gap in services by providing much needed medical and educational assistance. It also aims to set a benchmark in green building design. The two-storey facility will provide space for physiotherapy, education and training, administration and recreation. It will also include outdoor physiotherapy, playground and landscaped areas.

Concept designs for the proposed facility were prepared in July 2008 by AWF’s partner firm BURO Architecture. However, due to a change of site location, and the recent impact of Typhoon Ketsana, the concept is being re-developed. AWF staff visited Dien Ban in October 2009 to review the new site and also to assess damage by Ketsana. The typhoon hit Quang Nam province with winds of up to 144 km/h with the flow on affect of the worst flooding on record. Fortunately the Kianh Foundation has been spared significant damage on this occasion. AWF will work with BURO architecture over the next 3-4 months to develop revised concept designs for the Disability Day Centre, which is scheduled to go to construction by mid 2010.