Mparntwe Speaks // Sandra Meihubers
"Mparntwe Speaks" is a series of talks, initiated by dogspike design & brings together leading voices in design, architecture, art, culture, and research. The common thread? Creative thinking that emerges from living and working in Central Australia.10th April 2025…
Sandra Meihubers is a dentist – but not the kind you might expect. She has spent most of her career venturing into places where dentists have rarely dared to denture.
I met Sandra through her late husband, Paul Pholeros – an architect, advocate, and a larger-than-life figure in the fight for the right to good design for people living in poverty. Paul taught me at university, and in 2013 I travelled with him to Nepal on the first “Student Sanitation Studio” run through the University of Newcastle. That’s when I began to learn that Sandra casts her own powerful shadow.
For decades, she’s been a stalwart of community-owned and operated dental programs in some of the most remote parts of Australia – and beyond. What struck me early on was Sandra’s deep care for people and her sheer joy in connecting with them. Whether it’s the taxi driver en route to dinner, a hotel waiter, or a plumber in a remote Nepali village – she knows their name, where they’re from, and something about their family. Sandra is deeply curious and always finds the good in others.
With this in mind, we invited Sandra to speak at “Mparntwe Speaks” on the topic of people and process. She embraced the opportunity by presenting something unexpected: her entry into the Australian Institute of Architects’ Social Impact Award – a sanitation block and a caretaker cottage in Nepal. Yes, a dentist submitting an architectural award. Sandra doesn’t claim to be an architect, but she is an expert in working in remote areas, navigating complex challenges, and supporting local communities in meaningful, practical ways.
Figure 1 - Kata Tjuta (The Olgas), heading towards the APY Lands. Where Sandra started her remote work
Her journey as a remote dentist began in the early 1980s in the APY Lands of northern South Australia, working for Nganampa Health as their first-ever dentist travelling for nine weeks across the APY Lands, using portable dental equipment. After a few years of this, Sandra and her colleague managed to secure independent funding to establish a full-time dental program. This program has now been running for over 40 years, evolving from a mobile service to purpose-built clinics. While working in these remote communities, Sandra found herself missing her husband. Coincidentally, the local clinic was looking for an extension, and Sandra offered, “My husband’s an architect.” This simple statement proved to be a pivotal moment. “That was Paul’s first footprint on the (APY) lands,” Sandra recalls. “It exploded from there.”
Figure 2 - Dental Assistant Karen and the remote dental clinic using all portable gear, the same gear used by military forces for work in the field.
In 1985, local leader Yami Lester unknowingly started Healthabitat, an organisation that would shape the rest of Paul’s career. Yami brought together Paul Pholeros (architect), Paul Torzillo (medical doctor), Stephi Rainow (anthropologist), and a local Anangu team to focus on the pressing issue of health and the living environment. Yami had noticed that people were being treated for common infections at local clinics, only to return to homes where the same conditions caused those infections to flare up again. This led to the development of the Healthy Living Practices, a series of principles to allow a house to provide the health giving benefit it should. summarised by Yami as: “water in, shit out.”
In 1994, the first Housing for Health project was launched in Pipalyatjara, with a budget of $40,000. Today, the program has helped improve over 10,000 homes across Australia. The work Sandra and Paul did in the APY Lands solidified two key principles that would guide their careers: “poor people don’t deserve poor solutions,” and “always work with and employ local people.”
Figure 3 - The Himalayas of Nepal, a consistent backdrop to the villages Sandra worked in since 2000.
Sandra’s commitment to remote health extended far beyond central Australia. Her experience includes a range of international projects. In 2000, Sandra began volunteering in Nepal, where she started a 25-year relationship with the country and its people. This journey involved plenty of dentistry – and, once again, a strong connection to Paul’s work.
When the civil war forced the withdrawal of the dental team she had been working with, Sandra continued going to Nepal, visiting at least once, sometimes twice, a year. She secured AusAid funding to train local dental teams. Since there was no formal dental college, training was done on the job, and Sandra formed a close partnership with Bishnu, a leader of a local organization. Together, they led dental teams to remote villages.
Over time, Sandra became close with one village and learned about their development plan: 1) income generation, 2) sanitation, 3) education, and 4) job creation. Sandra wasn’t sure how much she could contribute to some of these goals, but once again she offered that she knew someone that might be able to help.
Paul Pholeros worked closely with the community designing a toilet system that included water storage, an above-ground toilet, and an underground waste treatment system, complete with a biogas option.
Figure 4 - The Design for the toilet in Nepal, made largely of locally available labour and materials.
They had some local resistance from the wealthier Nepalese who would comment “why are you working with poor people, they won’t value what you give them, they store their corn in there” (referring to the toilets). Of course if the people that make these comments went to experience these conditions themselves in any detail they would have seen the reality of the situation. That the status quo of toilets was a well meant but useless hole in the ground (typically funded by an NGO) with the only function provided by the (mostly) waterproof toilet structure, Paul wrote a brilliant article on this. Over the next decade Sandra and Paul with a dedicated local team delivered 137 toilets over several communities.
In 2015, Nepal was hit by two devastating earthquakes. Sandra and Paul flew straight over to assist their (now) friends and colleagues, and they were on the ground during the second 7.5 magnitude earthquake. Sandra focused on providing immediate domestic relief, while Paul worked on creating temporary cooking stoves and shelters, using lightweight materials and local skills. All the toilets they had built survived both earthquakes, a testament to the power of good design and construction.
After the earthquakes, Sandra and Paul shifted their focus to rebuilding. They worked with local details, Nepalese & Australian engineers and architects to design concrete and steel banding to make homes earthquake-resistant. They provided a subsidy for this ‘earthquake banding’ to allow local people to rebuild safely.
Figure 5 - The ‘earthquake banding ties the building together so that it shakes as one element rather and stays together rather than shaking itself to pieces during an earthquake.
Paul passed away on February 1, 2016. Sandra knew that, regardless of everything she would not let his memory die. She established the Paul Pholeros Foundation, without really knowing what their first project would be. While staying in Nepal, the local community came to her with a request: would she consider helping to build a toilet block at their sacred site? The site often hosted large gatherings, but there were no facilities.
Sandra’s heart lifted – this was a project she could take on.
Figure 6 - The “best toilet in Nepal” with the team that came together to build it.
The toilet was designed by former students of Paul’s who had experience working in Nepal. In 2019, the Foundation sent its first fellows – a plumber and a media graduate – to help build and document the project. As Sandra showed us photos she points out, by name, the carpenter, the plumber, and the stupa caretakers who became an integral part of the team. The caretakers’ home, a small, rudimentary tin shack, soon became the next project for the Foundation.
Figure 7 - Stupa caretakers house, this couple’s job was to maintain the stupa area which included the newly built toilet.
Sandra laughs as she reflects on the journey: “The fact that I’m a dentist is totally irrelevant at this point.”
The caretakers’ house, built by local teams, was completed in 2024 right near “the best toilet in Nepal.”
Figure 8 - Stupa caretakers house after the Paul Pholeros Foundation had designed and built a simple but new dwelling for the couple.
Now, we wait for the awards to be announced, to see if these two buildings – built on a 25-year relationship – will stand as symbols of a project that truly values people and process.
