The architecture of Studio Advaita taps into the essential purpose of building with structure, skin, and details that are contextual and inspired from the immediate: a practice where the eye draws from observations of cultural and historical contexts.
History is an omnipresent context since buildings are made with an intention to last. And good architecture acknowledges that cultural ideas about how buildings are used outlast the actual built-form. The Shivsagar School in Assam and the Agricultural Training Centre in Ahmednagar are illustrations of architecture as applied art, wherein the abstraction is evident in the relationship between the built and the unbuilt.
The Shivsagar School, Assam
Tucked away in a site replete with tall, dense foliage of interior Assam, the Shivsagar School’s organic layout is a responsive derivation from tracing light-wells which act as open courtyards. Run by an NGO and built with the help of the local community, the structure uses indigenous materials and technology fused with modern needs to allow the dissemination of knowledge to a community. The classrooms have open configurations, and an education programme restructured to focus on building confidence among students.
The natural landscape and designed spaces complement each other more than being distinctly experienced as outdoor and indoor spaces respectively. At Studio Advaita, preliminary conceptual ideas emerge out of contextual situations. When architecture must find a place amidst abundant nature, Rasika Badave describes how,
Travelling through distinct landscapes across the country, we observe the colours and patterns of life, and in this way attempt to reinterpret their inherent relationship with materials.
Responding to climatic conditions, a sloping roof is projected from all sides like the commonly used traditional cap ‘jappi’, which protects the entire body from sun and rain – and is made from woven bamboo, just as the building envelope is itself composed of openable bamboo panels that facilitate interaction and play.
Agricultural Training Centre, Ahmednagar
Amidst the dusty terrains of interior Maharashtra, the Syngenta Foundation and Snehalaya (NGO) came together to build an Agricultural Training Centre in Ahmednagar for children of marginalised farmers where they can engage with and learn about various new agricultural techniques through short-term courses.
Recording preliminary observations of the site and its surroundings, the following verse is a summary that instils in the observer/reader- a unique sense of place and space:
Black rock like a crocodile back surfaces
Spread out in the scorching afternoon heat
A single, narrow dusty trail passes by
A small pond that has dried up completely
Hot, dusty air blows under a brightly lit afternoon sun
Factory smoke makes its way into the clear sky
A saffron flag flutters on top of a temple in the distance
A sudden plunge of a black kite towards its prey and a deep, shrill cry
A vast, barren plateau with dusty, hot air
It was the most desolate and lonesome environment
With a dry, pale green and brown landscape
Two dark men with pale, bent bodies worked slowly at the brick kiln
A bullock cart passes by with a rattling sound
Under a babul tree sat a shepherd in a pink turban with his goats, observing us.
Situated on barren land with recurring droughts, the design of the building is introverted overlooking an off-centred courtyard space. The configuration of the basic square plan with an open space is derived from the traditional domestic structures or ‘wadas’ of nearby villages. The external staircase and building envelope are carefully designed to reduce costs and harmonise with adjacent surrounding structures. Grey and coloured fly-ash bricks are used with a cavity for thermal insulation in the external walls, and all internal spaces receive natural, indirect light to minimize dependence on electricity.
In the many conversations, definitions, and boundaries that initiate, inform, and influence the architecture of learning spaces; it is the communities who inhabit these spaces that lend them an identity which takes over its architecture eventually. Traversing diverse climatic conditions, cultures, and demographics, the work of Studio Advaita finds continuity in the perceived language of their architecture which appears familiar but at the same time, it is complex in its resolution of nuances with respect to the site and its surroundings ⊗
STUDIO ADVAITA is an architecture studio based out of Pune and Mumbai. Led by Prasad Badave and Rasika Badave, the practice is engaged in working innovatively on Architecture, Planning, Conservation, and Interior Design.
