Ernst May and the Built Utopia of the Satellite Cities in East Africa

After his experience in the Weimar Republic and the USSR, Ernst May bought 1934 a farm in Tanzania. Still, he soon found himself sitting at the drawing table in Nairobi, eager to restart his work as an urban planner. The research aims to investigate the projects that the German architect designed and realised in the East Africa region targeting the process of contextualising a model already experimented with in Eu rope: The Trabantestadt. Ersnt May reshaped the development of the cities accord ing to the satellite growing process involving himself not only on the scale of the site plan but also on the definition of the single unit. Two case studies are analysed through a comparative method highlighting the analogies with the past and the con tinuity with the local context: The Kampala Extension Scheme and the Port Tudor Settlement. Once he regained freedom, in 1947, after being imprisoned by the Allies, he carried out a project to redevelop some districts of the Ugandan capital city. The overall plan is notable for its progressive idea of including large settlements for low- and middle-income indigenous people, resulting in one of the first large resi dential projects designed for East African locals. Then, May worked in the port city of Mombasa, Kenya, which saw its economy and population proliferating, given its strategic location on the coast of the Indian Ocean. In 1952, the German architect designed the first social housing project for Africans in Port Tudor, understanding the importance of tackling the housing issue of different social income classes by providing affordable and flexible typologies. Moreover, Ernst May’s legacy is studied, which has been stretched to nowadays, with the new Master Plan of Kigali based on a polycentric urban development strategy. The capital city of Rwanda represents a definitive case study in the East African Region and the whole continent tackling the issue of urban growth through the project.