How does one work with Staircase Designs that Impede Glazing?

Architecture of a State distanced from Religion February 7th, 2022

Staircases work as both design and functional elements. They do serve as the means to transport you from one level of a building to another, but in case of duplex houses with something like double height floor spaces, they can add beautiful aesthetics as well.

Architecture is Dependent on Political Motivations

Architecture of a State distanced from Religion February 7th, 2022

Politics is often intertwined with the religion of the moment of a region. In this article, I wish to focus on the impact of regional politics in a particular time period on the architectural decisions that are taken by the dispensing entities. Admittedly, religious fervour and the self belief of an architect in a particular God or ideal leads to beautiful creativity as is seen in our most beloved monuments, and I can never question the ability of faith in rallying people towards the daunting cause of not only designing something to perfection but also in achieving the immense task of the build out.

Let's start with the Cathedrals that were built out in Europe and come to some of our most beloved temples, masjids, and of course the Taj Mahal! The monuments were of course built as a testament to the belief of the ruling entity of the time but I am yet to see equanimity of thought or generosity of purse towards building something contrary and to the otherwise. I am yet to see a temple built as splendidly as the Konark or Khajuraho through the patronage of Akbar or Shah Jahan nor mosques commissioned by the Catholic Europeans.

Given the clarity and history with which architecture has been motivated around the world, I find it interesting then that how would Architectural motivations spread out in a "Truly Secular" environment. While the state itself has therefore distanced itself from any overt predilection towards a monument to any single religion, the political offices being built then today follow what styles? What and how are they motivated? Where do they take inspirations from?

Precast Architecture - An Oxymoron?

Will the standardization imposed by Precast Economics sound the death-knell for Architectural Creativity? January 15th, 2022

Till now civil construction companies have been operating the construction of buildings in a the known and comfortable cast-in-situ method. The formwork is generally custom made to the project and most of it perishes within a few uses. Plywoods will give you probably 4-6 uses while custom steel made forms can go into a lot more. The paradigm has always been thus for an architect to bring to force their imagination and creativity in designing structures which could be achieved through unique combinations of structural form elements and the limitations of concrete pour.

Precast technology is not only improving in strides but is also increasingly adopted and experimented by companies from the scale of L&T to smaller builder entities. Government is also pumping in the money towards the research and development for building out faster and more economical units to be deployed towards the housing of the EWS and for disaster relief. What I see however is the optics of the economical benefit as well as the enhanced construction speeds being adopted mass scale by the bigger township development entities that shall look towards achieveing fast, uniform, and maybe "posh and upscale" dwelling units similar to the urban sprawl seen in many of the socities and enmass cities in the United States.

The contrary argument is that precast technologies will also allow for the expression of greater creativity among architects especially if the promises made by 3D printing robots bear fruit. However, it must be understood that such projects will be unaffordable for the smaller architects as the "factories" making such formwork will be far and few nor will such 3D printing robots be easily accessible and affordable to the general public. Like the sadly growing income disparity across the world, I fear a growing "architectural-creativity" disparity as well where amazingly beautiful buildings will be built by the very few and then a large segment of human existence shall be shepherded into standardized precast models.