The story
New dormitories expand a working coffee farm’s capacity to welcome young people.
Vida Joven’s La Finca near Jinotega operates as both a youth camp and a working coffee farm. Coffee sales help make camp attendance possible, tying the productive landscape directly to the organization’s programs. The expansion proposed two dormitories and a staff center with housing, increasing the number of young people the farm could host while giving resident leaders a more dependable base for care and operations. Confined masonry and other earthquake-conscious construction guidance in the project archive points to a central technical concern in Nicaragua: sleeping buildings must be simple to build, carefully reinforced, and durable in a seismic region.
Dormitory life also depends on shade, ventilation, sanitation, supervision, and shared outdoor space—not beds alone. The portfolio record targeted completion in 2015, but the reviewed archive does not independently verify that the expansion was finished. It should therefore be described as a planned project. Its strength is the relationship between place and program: the farm helps fund camp, and the buildings allow that welcome to grow.
