DESIGN NOTE
Proposed Community Centre at (mention place as follows: Sawantwadi, Sindhudurg/ Khaparkheda, Nagpur/ Kolhapur/Aurangabad/Mahabaleshwar) for the local Craft Community and local neighborhood users.
SAMRUDDHI MITTAL
● Brief synopsis
An architecture of (choose whatever is your choice for your scheme, 1.Resilience/2. Dignity/3.Inclusivity/4.Delight/5.A Co-Existence) for the proposed community centre for the (mention craft community here) and the local neighborhood people of the place, that addresses the opportunity to create a platform of facilitation and empowerment to the user group, through a sustainable design approach in the context of (place), and a Hot & Dry/Warm & Humid/Cold & Cloudy/Composite/Moderate climatic context.
The design encourages a flexible approach to the main spaces to be able to host a variety of activities as per the need in the local scenario. The overall design environment organizes a communal experience and interaction amongst the various participatory groups in the centre so as to alleviate the sense of isolation or gated community aspect from the minds of the user group.
The technology scheme addresses a sustainable approach towards the structural scheme/choice of materials/use of local building craft towards creating a closed loop system of the building systems as far feasible in the context of the design.
The overall built up area consumed by the project is (mention your final BUA), the design offers a G+2/3/4 built environment with a host of programs to generate the sense of communal character and interaction.
Whose Background Are We Talking About?
What Are The Most Significant Aspects Of These People Or Subject Of study to establish the identity of the same
What are the most significant
problem areas affecting the target group of study? (Expand upon your research regarding insufficiency towards exposure to education, to information and an idea of aesthetics (groomed, tidiness, cleanliness) towards various aspects of life.)
How shall the community center address these areas of problems? (Mention the semi urban location as an interface to increase exposure and opportunities of various kinds to expand growth)
To start off with, I'd like to give a brief description of what we are going to discuss here.
We are designing a community center for the town of Sawantwadi located in Sindhudurg, Maharashtra, india. As the name suggests a community center is a place where the entire community / town / all the locals come together for various occasions for various purposes for example, learning, celebrating, dining, formal protesting and seeking for financial and physiological help
The site we’re designing is a 25 by 40 meter plot located right in front of the city lake called moti talao
The site is within a kilometer of the city garden, the sub district hospital, 2 3 highschool colleges and around 5 6 hotels. The site is densely filled with local trees such as palm trees, coconut trees , banana trees and bushes and plants
The site being located in a hot and humid climate my primary focus is to enhance the concept of inclusivity in the complex and secondary focus to develop a climate responsive approach to design a self sustaining design were to promote the wind circulation, let in diffused light and harvest rainwater.
Let's just briefly discuss my solution or strategies to promote my design approach.
If we first talk about the most important climatic aspect of the site, the site being in a warm and humid climate has a very high humidity level and a humid climate mixed with hot sun creates a very suffocating and sweaty atmosphere To deal with these issues our spaces should be designed in such a way that they promote/ enhance natural wind flow. This being a community project will be looked after by the municipality and they certainly would prefer if the repair and maintenance cost can be as low as possible, therefore our spaces have to be designed in a spread out manner to reduce cost of ventilation ducts.
Next approach would be to cut off the harsh sun in summers, because even if we promote wind flow and the sun is right on our head, bright at its peak in summers it’ll heat up the wind and high wind speed with high wind flow will create several uncomfortable scenarios and diseases. Therefore it's the climate's responsive appraoch’s need to cut off the harsh sunlight in summers and get in diffused light to maintain a comfortable climate.
As Sindhudurg is an area where it rains throughout the year our next major approach would be to harvest the rainwater and use it for all kinds of water requirements in the centre
Our never ending approaches do have to be put in a list and here I'm only discussing a few selected major approaches but we’ll discuss the other minor approaches as we go further down in the paper
The most significant aspect of the people near our site is that they have already started to experience spaces designed by architects similar to such spaces in an urban locality but the local people are yet to come out of their rural ways to living.
The locals and the royal family of the area are now worried about their dying craft of making ganjifa cards. As the community expands most of the youngsters leave the town in need of further study and very few stay back to help and revive the art of making ganjifa and other traditional crafts and art The need here is to get people involved and attracted to the dying art of ganjifa again
1 Educational necessities - in sawantwadi not more than 2km away from our site we have two graduating colleges
● BACKGROUND OF THE PROJECT
2 Healthcare facilities right next to our site we have a well established sub district hospital
3. Community place for everyone to come together for the past few years is an established park not more than 1 km away from the site The park has a few noticeable architectural aspects Landscaping(roof garden, sunken structures) is one noticeable feature of the park
● DESIGN APPROACH
What kind of opportunity can be seized/created through the design & why do you feel that necessary (This is where you expand on your KEYWORD and try creating a justification of the same w.r.t the user group involved).
What should the design approach include in its overall sense of things? (Variety of programs and activities, age groups/genders/day-night programs/larger group programs/individualized programs/employment opportunity/training programs/educative and social programs/community programs/support programs), mention what kind of technology for adaptable spaces( openable roof/movable walls/openable floors/movable envelopes), the use of passive solar strategies for design comfort(Natural Light, Natural ventilation), the idea of shared use of spaces and programs in and around the plot.
What is the design approach for a green campus (to enhance existing measures of conserving natural resources by means of technology)
The approach we would like to focus on is to promote and revive the dying art of ganjifa and giving it as a reason for people to become inclusive and to put and end the discrimitnation. also since the climate is hot and humid we have a wide variety of of flora and fauna and to an advantage of that we have like 10 15 palm and coconut trees of 10 12 meter height. To promote inclusivity we have to design a space which not only promotes it in humans but between all the organisms that share the space
● DESIGN SCHEME
We need to mention the overall design idea first? (refer to the main idea keyword(inclusivity)) and in what ways has the organization of mass, voids, openings, and elements of building been structured to reflect that idea. MACRO TO MICRO
The design initially began with keeping the idea of inclusivity in the mind and its start can itself be seen in the plan, the entrance is the same for all(service, staff, locals, vips, royals, vendors, etc.) Keeping the design a climate responsive structure we had to design spread out spaces but here as well we have kept the spaces inclusive in one structure. Every single room in the structure is naturally ventilated via cross ventilation, the windows are on both sides of the rooms. The passages are wide enough to keep them naturally ventilated and lighted.
The kind of spaces/volumes you have worked with the basic idea behind designing the structure the way it is to keep the circulation simple and utilise maximum area possible on each floor giving each space natural ventilation and plenty of inlets for natural light. Keeping the flow of air in mind the form and shape of the structure doesn't have any sharp edges to cut down on wind flow or wind speed, the spaces are all curvilinear and smooth on tha facades so that the wind can easily pass through as well as in and out the structure. The kind of levels and accessibility (circulation) the scheme offers
The kind of design environment created as an experience what will somebody feel in the place you have designed? A person on visiting the plot would feel inclusive and calm as the spaces designed are panacea( is something that can heal or cure anything).
The FSP & floor wise areas of the various activities as per design the relation between floor areas and the activities are dependent on the maximum number of people using the space at a given time(rule followed - each person requires an area of 2 sqms)
What are the ways in which the design works? Mention an outline.(not understanding the question that is to be answered, can u elaborate or add a few points that are to be looked into)
● DESIGN HIGHLIGHTS
Operational & Workable aspects of design
Details of how the design works, you can choose areas of special attention as per your own design. More the better
How does the idea of sustainable outcomes get reflected through the design in your scheme?
Response to climate aspects
Orientation and wind flow has paid more attention to, the structure is a spread out form and oriented to get maximum diffused light. Response to the CRAFT to Architecture brief
The main shape and form of the spaces has abstracted from ganjifa card form(the cards were originally square but due to over time the corners getting destroyed and folded the card shape evolved into circles, same way to promote and enhance the ventilation throughout the structure the shape and form are made into flowy-curvilinear spaces).The window, jali and column detailings are done enhancing the dying art of the community GANJIFA and wooden toys.
● TAKEAWAYS
Mention the outcomes of the design from the point of view of the learning outcomes as mentioned in the brief
1. Mention how does the design create an advantage through passive strategies
2. Mention stand out aspects of green campus scheme
The green campus approach I'm taking forward is that only cycle parking is provided in the structure and bike and car parkings are not allowed to enter the site. And we have e-tiolet facility on the sub-main road on the shorter axis boundary. Also the green scape has been done on all the floors.
3. Advantage of flexibility created due to your design
4. Relevance of technology from economic, social point of view-----the site of sawantwadi has a steel manufacturing plants also as the local craft is mainly made out of wood the local material is also timber and bamboo grows the best in hot and humid climate therefore my material palette would start and end a these three main materials that are - TIMBER, BAMBOO, STEEL and few reinforcement materials.
5. Write a few lines on why your Design Idea KEYWORD…….is going to give a certain identity to the end users of the project. -----the space or locality in which the project is located has already started to develop a sense of equality and inclusivity, we just want to promote the idea furthermore because we are designing a space which would have all kinds of locals coming in,(service, staff, locals, vips, royals, vendors, etc)
