Igbo Architecture

Igbo architecture is the traditional building tradition of the Igbo people of southeastern Nigeria, distinguished by its use of mud and laterite soil, stone, thatch, palm and reeds. Mud and clay form the foundations, walls and sometimes the roofs of buildings, wood provides structural beams and columns, and stone is used for foundations and, in some cases, walls; roofs are most often thatched from grass, palm leaves or reeds layered and woven onto a wooden frame. The tradition encompasses walled and moated compounds, verandas, courtyards and decorative motifs, and includes the Nsude pyramid shrines and the Mbari houses, sacred two story structures built as an act of propitiation and filled with life sized painted mud figures. Surfaces throughout the architecture carry symbolic decoration, including Uli design and Nsibidi script, worked as carvings and motifs across compounds and entrances.