Local architect José Fernando Gómez, whose Babahoyo-based studio, Natura Futura, has partnered with river residents since 2019 to reimagine and build a permanent neighborhood on the water, understands.
“I grew up bathing in that river, all of it was completely normal to me,” says Gómez. “We consider these floating homes and the riverbank as an extension of the city. But what happens with public policy, and these so-called 'marginalized territories,' is that politicians come along and say, ‘We have to get rid of this, it’s no good. Don’t go near the river, that’s where poverty comes from.’”
Just six years before the 2016 displacement, the floating neighborhoods of Babahoyo had been acknowledged by the Ecuadorian government when their wood construction techniques were recognized by the National Institute of Cultural Heritage as being part of the country’s intangible heritage.
We are interested in deconstructing the idea of social architecture. When we talk about community, they aren’t the community, I am also part of the community.
But Brisas del Río severed ancestral and physical connections to the river. Families lost income, accrued debt, and forfeited social connections upon separation from their riparian livelihoods. Rather than nurture and repair the fraying relationship to the river, the displacement had accelerated rupture between the community and the environment with which they were so intertwined.
Víctor Amaiquema stands outside the doorway of his new floating house, looking out to the river. Behind him, the robust local wood is stained the color of honey. Traditionally, the floating homes of Babahoyo have no true doors; windows and doorways serve similar functions to let in air and light while walls made of split bamboo cane promote visibility from inside. A louvered door and latticed windows in his new home maintain that design logic. Amaiquema has been a canoe-maker and fisherman all his life; now his living space opens to an airy unit for storing and cleaning his work equipment.
His neighbor, Doña Teresa Mariscal, shares her home with her brother Rodolfo, whom she cares for. Their new house floats 60 cm above the waterline, with an accessible bathroom and furniture on the first floor. Outside, Mariscal watches her grandchildren play on an expansive deck.
Keeping each home afloat is a grid of more than 40 recycled flotation tanks, held together by lightweight metal and more local wood. A flexible bridge connects each one to the riverbank, and to the city. As a system, each is designed to rise and fall with the river's seasonal rhythm, up with the rainy season in winter and down with the dry in summer.
“We had to build each [foundation] on land first, so we could fit the tanks,” explains local builder Roswell Suárez. “And once we had it floating, we started with the flooring, then the uprights, then the trusses, weaving the rest of the structure together right there on the river.”
A new water filtration and rainwater system supplies each home with 300 liters of clean water a week and saves families as much as a third of their monthly household income that had previously been spent to buy clean water. Dry toilets connected to the same system turn waste into fertilizer, rather than letting it reach the river untreated.
As neighbors reviewed home designs with José, their input began to shift the project's focus outward, from private dwellings to the public spaces and ecological commons connecting them. Each of the eight homes in El Barrio Flotante now connects by bridge to a 150-meter floodable walking path that traces the riverbank, linking house to house and the neighborhood to the city.
Flood-resistant trees like pechiche and guayacán help the riverbank resist erosion as they root down into the earth, while filtering the water to help facilitate a cleaner riverbed. Matapalo, a hollow tree native to the river, is often home to birds and bats that nest within its trunk. In time, egrets, toads, and fish are expected to return to the water, signs of a biodiverse living system in recovery.
“We are interested in deconstructing the idea of social architecture,” says Gómez. “When we talk about community, they aren’t the community, I am also part of the community. And once you enter from that place of awareness, from that understanding of the territory, you start to see that architecture can generate real transformation.”
On a humid October afternoon in 2025, all eight homes were completed and the collective reimagining of the neighborhood was celebrated with music, food, and performance. Low tide meant the floodable public plaza wasn’t flooded at all and served as a stage to gather the residents and neighbors of the new Barrio Flotante. Just a few months later when the space was submerged underwater during the rainy season, families flocked to the pool and set up their snack tables and multicolored parasols on the public dock. Kids splashed about and did backflips into the water as more music blared from vending carts parked on the bank.
The Floating Neighborhood is the first of its kind in Ecuador to be recognized as part of a city’s official urban structure, while a public policy advocacy campaign for the rights and permanence of the neighborhood continues to unfold. Municipal officials attended design reviews hosted by the community and supported some construction logistics, opening a conversation for the first time since the 2016 resettlement program.
“This is a recovery of our heritage,” explains Gómez. "Living on the river has always been part of this city: working with local wood and caña guadua,A giant bamboo native to South America (Guadua angustifolia), widely used in construction in Ecuador and Colombia. stewarding the riverbank ecology and the traditional techniques that were both being lost. It all helps us keep that connection between river and land, and plants a seed for the next generation.”
Under a shared-responsibility agreement with the city of Babahoyo, residents are to retain ownership of their homes, bridges, and filtration systems, while the city commits to stewarding the public paths and spaces.
For his part, Don Pedro is optimistic about the future his community has shaped for itself. “It gives me hope. Maybe I’ll go fishing again. I’m going to go fishing again.”