A storehouse for the present 

In Cusco, days can be measured by the wind. Mornings are cool but still. By midday, as the temperature climbs several degrees warmer than at dawn, the wind begins to barrel down the snow-capped apus, the sacred mountain peaks that tower above the valley. By afternoon, the cold breath of the mountain reaches its height, blanketing the fields in a forceful chill.

For centuries, Andean peoples have organized their lives around this variable climate, reading the wind, frost, sun, and rain as both temporal markers and vital resources. They built qollqas, Quechua for storehouses, to work with these forces: structures designed to harness the wind, to make the most of the cold, and to keep food and materials fresh.

In today’s changing climate, the notion of taking advantage of the weather takes on a renewed urgency. Among the research and actions proposed to face this reality, the qollqa reemerges as an ancestral technology that could serve as a model for climate adaptation: protecting harvests, sustaining community food sovereignty, and reimaging preservation as both an art and an act of care.

With that spirit, our project began to take shape. In the highlands of Moray, just above MIL Centro, and in collaboration with the Colparay sector of the K’acllaraccay community, we brought together archaeological insight, local knowledge and practices, and contemporary realities to shelter and protect the fruits of collective labor: potatoes, grains, tubers (such as oca, ulluco, mashua, and more), medicinal plants, seeds, and even textiles and leather. It serves as a pantry for both MIL Centro and the Colparay sector of K’acllaraccay, as well as a living space of experimentation that unites architecture, ecology, gastronomy, and Andean traditions. 

The Mater Qollqa learns from the past but is neither a replica nor a reconstruction. Informed by traditional preservation practices, ancestral Andean knowledge, and the local ecology of the Moray area, it is an architectural experiment designed to learn from the wind and revive ancient techniques so that climate and craftsmanship work together. Built collectively, it extends an ancestral logic into the present, transforming preservation into a way of thinking, building, and caring for the future.

More than a qollqa, this project is driven by interdisciplinary goals and a multidisciplinary team seeking to reactivate ancestral practices while fostering local collaboration, food science research, and new ways of looking to the past as a source of solutions for the future.

“INCA STOREHOUSE, COLLCA / Topa Ynga Yupanqui / administrator, suyoyoc / apo Poma Chaua / Inka's storehouses / qullqa / suyuyuq / apu /” Guaman Poma de Ayala, F. (ca. 1615). The first new chronicle and good government [Drawing 132, “Storehouses of the Inka, qullqa,” p. 337]. Royal Danish Library. https://poma.kb.dk/permalink/2006/poma/337/en/text/ 

Lessons from the past: learning from the Incas and their ancestors

Long before the Inca built their vast imperial networks, Andean communities already knew how to preserve life and the fruits of their labor in the highlands. The Inca expanded and refined that knowledge, building thousands of qollqas, storehouses that linked architecture, climate, sustenance, and security, across their territory, from coastal deserts to the glacial edges of the altiplano (Morris 1967).

In places like Ollantaytambo, towering above Pachacuti’s royal estate (Protzen 2005), or at the vast administrative and ceremonial center of Huánuco Pampa (Morris 1992; Barnes 2012) rows of Inca stone storehouses still line the slopes. Each has a small opening or subterranean vent angled toward the wind source, often facing sacred apu mountain peaks from which the cold air descends. Qollqas were usually placed in high, cool, and windy places, with varied circular, rectangular, or elongated forms carefully matched to what they stored. Some wind-cooled qollqas, called wayrana (from wayra, Quechua for “wind”), stored grains or legumes; darker, closed ones protected potatoes and tubers (Pérez Trujillo 2024). Beneath their floors, stone channels drained moisture and stabilized temperature, turning each structure into a finely tuned environment.

Safeguarding the harvest was not simply a technical triumph but a social one. Stored properly, food could last years, sustaining armies, communities, and ceremonial practices through drought or frost. 16th-18th century Spanish and Indigenous writers described these warehouses as large enough to feed entire populations or itinerant armies (Guaman Poma de Ayala 1616; Cobo 1653), but their importance went far beyond logistics. The qollqa enabled agricultural specialization, experimentation, and the creative expansion of diets across seasons. In a landscape of extraordinary biodiversity, preservation was a form of abundance: a means to balance the diet, combine complementary crops, and nourish not only the body but the social fabric and ritual networks that bound communities together.

Today, as Andean communities face increasing food insecurity and nutritional deficits, the qollqa reappears as more than an archaeological curiosity. It stands as a model for ecological resilience,and a reminder that preservation traditions are both technology and philosophy. The ability to make architecture that responds to air, humidity, and altitude to conserve products, and to design in coexistence of the environment, struck me and the project team as profoundly relevant to the present.

Learning from the past, the Mater Qollqa continues this lineage. Our interdisciplinary project team behind the project understands preservation and storage as an art, a practice, and a way of maintaining balance among elements. For thousands of years, Andean builders have experimented with elevated chambers and ventilated terraces: early versions of the same logic that treats architecture as the extension of the landscape. In Moray, that principle lives on. Learning from the past allows us to design for a present defined by environmental change, where technology must be ecologically entangled, born not from control over nature but in dialogue with it.

Designing the flow

Above the circular Inca terraces of Moray, and within walking distance of MIL Centro, stands the Mater qollqa, a contemporary storehouse that unites ancestral principles and current local practices of preservation into a new, innovative architectural form, rooted in both place and past. Designed by architect Juan Carlos Pareja in dialogue with my archaeological and architectural research, and built collectively with members of the K’acllaraccay community in their Colparay sector, the structure follows the same ecological logic that guided Inca builders: orientation, airflow, and the reciprocal relationship between architecture and terrain.

Without being a replica or reconstruction, the circular plan and light stone walls of the qollqa evoke regional precedents, from the rounded pre-Inca storehouses of Raqchi (Sillar et al. 2019) to those at Ch’eqoq (Quave et al. 2019) and Machu Qollqa (Delgado Gonzalez et al. 2024). Its thatched ichu grass roof and stone floor  ground it in local materials, while its main opening faces the snow-capped mountains to channel descending winds through the interior. The structure’s wind derives from several apus, the Quechua term for sacred mountain peaks, including Cruz Moqo, Waqtay Willki, and Mach’ay Pata, but especially from Verónica, the tallest and most glaciated in the region.

Inside, sixteen smaller chambers–micro-qollqas–are designed to create distinct microclimates of temperature, humidity, and ventilation suited to the products they hold: seeds, grains, medicinal plants, tubers, and preserved foods. A central oculus filters light into the structure, creating gradations of diffuse light, shade, and darkness, while an internal channel collects rainwater and directs humidity towards certain chambers, partially draining through the structure to keep others dry. Each micro-qollqa becomes a small-scale experiment in how architecture can respond to climate and protect a variety of materials under one roof.

The orientation, materials, and airflow of the structure are designed not for permanence but for evolution. Sensors will monitor temperature, humidity, and air movement, allowing the team to observe how cold mountain wind interacts with ground moisture and to adjust materials, openings, and layouts as needed.

Conceived as a living experiment, the Mater qollqa measures interaction with the climate even as it preserves, generating knowledge that can be shared, refined, and expanded. The data gathered will be shared with local partners, and studied academically. Its contemporary construction is informed by Andean practices of reading the landscape, a mode of building that continues to listen to the same forces of wind, water, and earth. In this way, it extends a long Andean architectural lineage and renews an architectural sensibility rooted in experimentation, reciprocity, care, and attention to local traditions.

 Apus visible from the Mater Qollqa and surroundings.

Building together: on community and interdisciplinary collaboration

From the start, the qollqa has been a collective project. Built with, for, and by the K’acllaraccay community, it represents collaboration, preservation, and research alike. The project has been carried out in full partnership with the Colparay sector of K’acllaraccay, led by member Wilber Juarez. The sector has generously hosted the qollqa on its land and is its formal owner.

Before construction began, architect Juan Carlos Pareja and architecture student Luis Matías worked closely with community members to understand local food storage practices and traditional building materials. They also visited ancient qollqas and modern storage centers like INIA Cusco (National Institute of Agrarian Innovation). These conversations informed the design as much as archaeological perspectives or environmental data, ensuring that the project grew directly from community traditions.

Construction began in May 2025, and each stage was a shared process of learning and experimentation, from preparing the stone and earth to assembling the ichu thatch roof as part of a traditional roofing ceremony. In the future, workshops on storage techniques organized by expert community members will accompany the ongoing use of the structure. Thus, the qollqa will function not only as a storage space but also as a community center: a living place of exchange, teaching, and care.

The idea for a contemporary qollqa had been part of Mater’s long-term vision since August 2023, when its director, Malena Martínez, first proposed the concept. The project gained new momentum the following year, when Malena and I met and began discussing how archaeological, architectural, and ecological research could expand its reach. This collaboration shaped the Mater qollqa as it exists today as a project that unites preservation, design, and food science through shared experimentation.

Coordinated by Mater’s project director, Patty Yraja, the project brings together a multidisciplinary team. Agronomist John Checca led the planning for product placement and protection within ideal microclimates, defining which product should be stored in each micro-qollqa, and helped outline the project’s future agricultural and scientific directions. Mater’s Humanities project director, Gabriela Huayaconza, has guided the project in alignment with the interests and practices of the K’acllaraccay community, and will continue leading community initiatives such as workshops and public engagement programs. 

As the project evolves, so will its networks of collaboration. We hope to involve new specialists, students, and community members in future research phases, spanning architecture, food science, agriculture, anthropology, and archaeology. The qollqa has already become a generative gathering space: it recently hosted a seed exchange with an Aymara community collective, a meaningful act of reciprocity embodying the project’s very spirit, where preservation begins with people and research is guided by practice.

The Mater Qollqa under construcción by Samantha Bloom.

Future directions: the qollqa as a community space, research center and experimental storehouse

We are approaching the completion of the Mater qollqa’s physical construction, but the project is only beginning. The building will continue to evolve as a space for measurement, learning, and collaboration, while serving as a community hub for reflection on many interconnected themes: food sovereignty, preservation, ancestral techniques, and experimentation. The data generated will inform future design adjustments–small shifts in material, opening, or layout–to refine how the structure preserves and protects what it holds. Through this process, the qollqa itself becomes a research instrument, an architecture that produces knowledge about its own environment to be studied and shared by specialists.

Looking ahead, we envision the qollqa serving as a space for research in food science and preservation. In collaboration with agronomists and food scientists, future studies could explore how different products–potatoes, maize, tubers, legumes, seeds, even preserved meats–respond to internal variations of humidity and airflow. Such experiments could help identify optimal conditions for each product and reimagine traditional storage practices as a generative form of transformation, where preservation is understood as a gastronomic dialog between matter and time.

Beyond these scientific possibilities, the qollqa also opens pathways for research in heritage and history. Future studies–potentially led by archaeologists, architectural historians, and ethnobotanists–could connect past qollqas with contemporary agricultural experiments. In my own research, I am struck by how little we still know about what was actually stored in qollqas or cultivated on nearby Inca terraces; pollen and paleobotanical analyses could offer those answers. By studying qollqas in relation to their landscapes, from local and ancestral forms to imperial Inca traditions, I believe that we can come to understand not only how they stored food and what exactly they stored, but how they embodied ideas of balance and reciprocity with climate. These reflections, in turn, could inspire future agricultural experiments, including the possible reintroduction of recovered seeds.

Finally, as a community space, the qollqa is poised to continue growing as a shared platform for exchange. Workshops, seed exchanges, and open research collaborations may bring together local farmers, students, and specialists. The members of K’acllaraccay will continue to use the qollqa as their own storehouse. What began as a building can evolve into a living platform for conversation, research, and care, joining ancestral knowledge and science in the name of food sovereignty and ecological resilience.

Bibliography

Barnes, Monica. (2012) Storage in Huanuco Pampa: A reevaluation. In. F. Zubieta Núñez (ed.) Memoria XVII Congreso Peruano del Hombre y la Cultura Andina y Amazónica, pp. 100-120. Huacho, Peru. 

Cobo, Bernabé (1890[1653]) History of the New World: Volumes I and II. Bibliófilos andaluces, Sevilla, España. 

Delgado Gonzalez, Carlos, Jaime Guardapuclla Aragón, y Carlo Soculaya Dávila (2024) Machuqolqa: From a temporary domestic village to an Inca storage center. Boletín de Arqueología PUCP 34: 50-75. 

Gaspirini, Graziano y Luise Margolies (1980) Inca Architecture. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN, EEUU. 

Guaman Poma de Ayala, Felipe (1936[1616]) The first new chronicle and good government, Instituto d'ethnologie, Université de Paris, Paris, Francia. 

Morris, Craig (1967) Storage in Tawantinsuyu. Doctoral thesis. University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, EEUU. 

Morris, Craig (1992) The technology of highland Inka food storage. In T.Y. LeVine (ed.), Inka storage systems, 237-258, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, OK, EEUU. 

Pérez Trujillo, Amelia (2024) Pinkulluna: "Hanging Storehouses" Of The Inkas. Presentation. Pontifícia Universidad Católica del Perú (PUCP), Lima. 

Protzen, Jean-Pierre (2005) Incas at Ollantaytambo: Architecture and Construction. Lima: Pontifícia Universidad Católica del Perú Editorial Fund. 

Quave, Kylie E., Sarah A. Kennedy, y R. Alan Covey (2019) Rural Cuzco before and after Inka imperial conquest: Foodways, status, and Identity (Maras, Peru). International Journal of Historical Archaeology 23: 868-892. 

Sillar, William, Emily Dean, & Amelia Pérez Trujillo (2019) The Bari occupation and the Inca cult of Viracocha in Raqchi, Cuzco. Revista Haucaypata.

Biography

Rachel Schloss is an anthropological archaeologist and architectural historian. As a PhD candidate at UCLA, she studies how the Inca shaped mountains into architecture, using soil, stone, and clay to create places of power, ceremony, and cultivation. Her research also explores how heritage building practices can be mobilized to meet the challenges of today.