2010 - (Vol. 02, Issue 01)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://192.248.9.226/handle/123/18673

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Frugality : considering an intimate modern
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Tayyibji, R
This paper is an attempt to examine one of the strands of Indian modernity that does not subscribe to the industrial presupposition as the basis of its discourse. Rather this is a modernity situated in a paradigm that is “agricultural” with far reaching implications both culturally and environmentally. The Paper is comparative, building up contrasts between concepts that underlie a modernity that is “Industrial” and one that is “agricultural”. It explores their respective attitudes and modes of “reduction”. The first, “Minimizing” and its aesthetic equivalent, Minimalism is located in the industrial and particularly in the processes of mass production. The second, “frugality” is its equivalent in an agricultural paradigm, and is rooted in relationships and concepts whose aesthetic and therefore architectural potentials have not been adequately elaborated. This paper aims to study the architectural implications of “Frugality” with its emphasis on the rural-agricultural rather than the urban- industrial, bodily relationship to space rather than visual and mental constructions of space, and an intimacy with the material, the tactile, and a world that is “Full” Historically speaking this paper explores the aesthetic and architectural implications of a “Gandhian” Modernity as being distinct from the ubiquitous modernity that is our “Nehruvian” legacy. Architecturally the paper develops, in contrast to the idea of “transparency”, that ubiquitous spatial need of all modern and minimal architecture, the idea of “Porosity”, an attitude of material continuity that does not distinguish between differing forms of matter. Where as the first requires a spatial continuity, the latter is based on a continuity of material. Through the description and analysis of Gandhiji’s residence, Hruday Kunj at his Ashram on the Sabarmati in Ahmedabad, this paper elaborates on the experiences of such architecture.
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Vernacular nautical architecture in transition: a case study of traditional Sri Lankan fishing craft
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010) Devendra, S
This paper concerns the so-called “catamarans” often considered archetypal Sri Lankan craft. These are of great antiquity although their age can only be guessed. The vernacular form evolved from the available bio-resources and the nature of inshore waters. The craft were made only of wood with all fastenings being, by choice, of coconut coir rope , a common Indian Ocean till technology till comparatively recently. They were dual-element craft, comprising of dug-out hull connected to outrigger float by spars. The entire craft was “flexible” and thus could cope with surf-induced torque. The hull being a monoxylon, its tough, rounded bottom could withstand frequent abrasion from crossing sand spits and being hauled up the beach. It was essentially a “skimming” craft, without a displacement hull and, hence, completely different from the double-outrigger craft of south-east Asia and Madagascar and the east African coast. Its origin can, perhaps, be linked to those of Oceania. The Sri Lankan craft remained unchanged for what must have been millennia. In the last quarter of the last century, changes manifested themselves: the gradual use of iron nails; the increasing use of GRP and of nylon cordage; the use of outboard motors and the consequent morphological changes such as the substitution for the double-ended configuration of a fixed bow and stern and others. The reasons for change included deforestation, changing priorities in life, cost of manufacture, loss of skills etc. that are dealt with in the paper. An important aspect is that, even the use of new materials and techniques has not changed the basic dual-element form of the craft. This apparent contradiction raises a fundamental question: when, in the course of transition, does a vernacular form cease to be vernacular? This paper is the first attempt to record the process of the ongoing transition of these craft.
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Architectural Heritage & Urban Identity Between Nostalgia & Reality: The Case Of Bahrain
(2010-12) El-Masri, S
The rich architectural heritage of Bahrain has been subject to dilapidation and destruction as a result of rapid urbanisation and its complex physical, social and economic dimensions. The two major cities of Muharraq & Manama have been undergoing profound changes facing serious challenges and problems that are threatening whatever left of the fine organic traditional urban ■≫ ■ Large scale developments, high-rise buildings, shopping centres and infrastructure expansions; coupled with political and economic changes; manifest these intricate processes of urban transformations. Remarkably enough, all these come at a time when globalization has dominated all aspects of life with its cliches, challenges and possible potentials. In such a complex situation, an important question could be asked of how urban identity could be sustained in fast-transforming cities? The paper focuses on sustaining the urban identity of panama and Muharraq that goes beyond the mere nostalgic romanticism to realistic futurism by employing a combination of observation and participation qualitative research methods. It aims to provide a holistic approach integrating between the various scenarios of restoration, new functional rehabilitation, in-fill and new development. Hence it examines not only the physical aspects but expands the discussion to a wide range of issues and their interrelations including appropriate land-use systems and building regulations, financial resources and incentives, education and heritage, urban and architectural practices, and stakeholders* involvement and institutional developments. The paper acknowledges that the approach should filter between short-term solutions and far-sighted strategies, between private interests and public good, between market efficiency and social welfare, between bottom up approaches and top down ones, between physical development and heritage protection and between large scale and small-scale developments. Based on this discussion, comprehensive policy measures are to be addressed focusing on the possibilities of turning the "wicked” challenges into "potential” opportunities
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The Grand And The Little Tradition: Tracing The Links Of Two Vernacular Building Types Of Sri Lanka
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Chandrasekara, DP
It is accepted that there is a strong link between the vernacular architecture and the grand architecture traditions. The relationship between the two is studied and analyzed in different ways. The present day architecture/architects often acknowledge the influence of vernacular on the contemporary building designs; the “Little tradition” guiding the “Grand”. On the other hand we see the inspiration of grand architecture paving the path for the emergence of unique vernacular built forms. This paper will examine the evolution of two significant vernacular building types of Sri Lanka; “Stupa houses” and “Image houses on Stone pillars” and their linkages to built forms of grand architecture. The relationship would be explained with reference to the basic ingredients of architecture; “function”, “technology” and “aesthetics”. The Stupa houses of the Kandyan period (15th to 18th century) has a strong connection with the classical architecture of “Watadage buildings” constructed during 7th to 11th century. The former has a simplified the built form avoiding the circular plan form and associated intricate construction technology. The image houses on stone pillars are considered as one of the finest examples of Sri Lankan vernacular architecture. The technology and aesthetics of the building has a strong connection with the two tooth relic shrines at Polonnaruwa. The latter belong to the grand style. The both building types have adopted the raised floor construction for different reasons. It protected the murals and other elements of “image houses on stone pillars” from rising dampness 81 insect attacks. In the case of tooth relic shrines the approach enhanced the significance of the main shrine. The paper would also attempt to understand the relationship of the architecture of the “Stupa houses” and “Image houses on Stone pillars” with the buildings belong to the folk architectural tradition of the island.
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Egypt's Vernacular Architecture, From Rural Settlement To Exotic Resorts
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Sakr, MM
For millennia, the Nubians of Upper Egypt faced harsh climatic conditions and scarcity of building materials. Yet they succeeded in building their shelters by using mud bricks to build thick walls, arches, domes and vaults. Nubian vernacular architecture, with its aesthetics and functionality was not discovered and appreciated until the late Egyptian Architect Hassan Fathy had started to study their settlements, architectural elements and building techniques in 1946. Since then Fathy has incorporated the traditional mud brick vaults and domes in his designs. His work is considered to be a revival in Traditional Architecture, and he became known for his theory of “Construction for the poor". Unfortunately most of his theories were neglected, and what attracted a number of architects was the use of traditional architectural elements. This led to the emergence of what can be called “Hassan Fathy Style", a style that has been applied tremendously in the past three decades to create luxurious resorts on the Red Sea shores. Such appropriation was encouraged by investors and developers to create an attractive and exotic built environment, one that fulfills the dreams of tourists who come to the region to enjoy the sea, sun plus an extra piece of cultural heritage The aim of this paper is to trace the evolution and revival of a type of Egyptian Vernacular architecture, and how it is transplanted in a new environmental, cultural and social context. The failure or success of this trend needs to be assessed, as it can either be a step on creating Neo vernacular architecture or just an abuse of Egypt's cultural and architectural heritage
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Reinterpreting Vernacular As A Strategy For Capacity-Building In The Urbanizing South: Architecture & Labour Policy-Making
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Pathiraja, M
Over the last 30 years, many countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America have experienced a strong expansion of their urban economy, irreversible changes to their rural economy, an increase in urban land values, internal migration, and the urbanization of the poor. Today, in many large cities of the region, these factors have facilitated and intensified the fragmentation of construction activity into almost separate spheres of production, with little or no reciprocal connections in training, know-how, and career-development paths, and consequent limitations in cross-system application of technology transfer. In such context, the discursive references of vernacular to create technically and culturally exclusive niche markets for architectural production could only reinforce the cross-market compartmentalization of building knowledge, and the subsequent inability of architecture to engage in social building production activities. Instead, this paper looks at the vernacular from a labour policy-making point of view, that is to integrate its 'on-the-job' training conceptions within a design and technological vocabulary that envisages real building projects as training grounds, thereby projecting the latter as a vehicle through which labour development opportunities linked.
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Creating New Vernacular: Re-Enacting Culture And Making Place In The Winter Camps Of Bahrain
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Dayaratne, R
Vernacular in many parts of the world, particularly those that are rapidly developing under the forces of globalization have been undergoing dramatic change. From total abandonment to superficial reconstructions, vernacular in such societies survive often on the edge of perceptual, social and physical space, unsure of their place in the world and unable to compete with the ever-modernizing social space. However, the desire to return to, and to immerse even momentarily in the traditional and vernacular have resurfaced in many a ways from ubiquitous designed villages and renovated historic centers to modern shopping malls in almost every modern community. In Bahrain, such desires manifest more clearly and determinately during every winter period, when the rich urban dwellers choose to reconstruct what is perceived to be a reproduced version of the Bedouin tents in the cold deserts of its hinterland. The traditional Bedouin tents in the Arabian deserts had indeed provided for all activities of life in the deserts in the past although now, they have been abandoned in preference to the individual villas, the compounds and the housing condominiums. Despite having been provided with the modern amenities such as electricity, satellite televisions, microwaves and barbecue settings, the winter tents seem to re-enact some of the unique cultural practices of the past Bedouin culture. This paper takes a closer look at the winter camps of Bahrain which have become a modern vernacular practice that borrows from and temporarily reconstructs a by-gone practice of every day living that had existed among nomadic Arabs. It examines the history of the traditional tents and Bedouin camps and the ways in which they relate to the contemporary vernacular of the winter camps. It takes the position that the future of the vernacular lies not only in the continuation of the old but the inventions of the new that builds upon those cherishable from the past.
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Bordering On Vernacular-The Tradition Of The Oriyur Shrine
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Thilagam, LT; Balasubramanian, V
The vernacular of a place is encoded in the architecture of the built form and enriched by the cultural practices of the people. This study explores the history and tradition of the Britto cult centered at the Shrine of St John de britto at Oriyur in the Pasumpon Muthuramalinga Devar district of Tamilnadu, South India. The religio-cultural context of the shrine and festival originating from the martyrdom in 1969 of John de Brittto, today has cut across religious affiliations and is more of a vernacular tradition connecting the local castes and communities. It is this mystic aspect of the Oriyur shrine, built and supported by traditional practices that this study intends to explore
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Enhancing The Quality Of Life By Maintaining The Cultural Values And Vernacular Functional Spatial Features Of Malay Vernacular Residences
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Hoseini, AG; Baharuddin, MN; Ibrahim, R; Dahlan, ND
The quality of contemporary residential functional spaces has been mostly based on style and modernity rather than the tradition of particular regional context. This has led to new buildings which are not based on the tradition of their own regional context. In view of the rapid modernization of Malaysia, the kampong house as a Malay vernacular architecture has been replaced by modern architecture. We are motivated to conduct this study because we observed the increasing loss of functional spatial features of kampong houses and their cultural values that support Malay local quality of life. The functional spatial features include spatial characteristics of functions and spaces that are based on local needs while the cultural values represent the local way of life. We posit that the loss of functional spatial features and cultural values is key to the diminishing quality of life for people living in contemporary houses. In this research, the vernacular architectural features of kampong houses representing Malay vernacular houses are studied using archival search. We use text analysis for analyzing the cultural meanings of vernacular functional spaces and their functional spatial features. The vernacular functional spatial features are the socio-cultural or environmental characteristics of a local region in a functional space. On the other hand, the cultural meaning of functional spaces is the value that represents the resident's local way of life in a functional space. The analysis determines the vernacular functional spatial features and cultural meanings of the functional spaces of Malay houses which represent the local needs. This study theorizes that the vernacular functional spatial features and the cultural meanings of functional spaces within Malay houses are influential in enhancing the quality of life. Correspondingly, the research found that the vernacular functional spatial features and their cultural values could support the quality of life while integrated successfully into contemporary functional spaces. Consequently, these features when utilized in designing contemporary functional spaces could exude the Malay local quality of life. In conclusion, the cultural values and functional spatial features of Malay vernacular functional spaces can be considered in contemporary residential design for enhancing the Malay quality of life in urban area.
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Designing The Vernacular: An Inquiry In The Processes Of Making In Kutch, India
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Soni, S
As understood popularly, vernacular is not just a simplistic interaction between the climate, culture and craft, but rather a composite body of knowledge processes developed over generations of experience through trial and error in response to the needs of people occupying them and to the requirements of the changing physical environment around them. With the hegemonic advent of present global monoculture, the evocation of sentimental vernacular seems quite a natural response in places with strong cultural traditions and their unique craft expressions. I am referring to that nostalgia for the vernacular which is being conceived as an overdue return to the ethos of popular culture. Rather than the critical perception of reality and creative synthesis, it rather evokes the sublimation of a desire for direct experience through imagery and rhetorical information. Its tactical aim is to attain, as economically as possible, a preconceived level of instant gratification in behavioristic terms. The aim of this paper is to explore the issue of validating the vernacular and inherent contradictions within it through two recent projects in the Kutch region of Gujarat in India. First project, Khamir Crafts Park, is a nongovernmental institution working for the development of craft traditions of Kutch region while the second one, Sham-e-Sarhad is an eco-resort built and run by local residents of Hodka village in the desert of Kutch. As the building craft and artisanal traditions of this region are intrinsic to making of both these projects, this paper will examine the process of interpretation and reinterpretation and the nature of the resultant architectural synthesis.
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Analysing The Morphological Changes In Vernacular Domestic Architecture Of Kerala, India Since 1947
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Bhooshan, BS; Kini, MK
This paper discusses morphological changes in the vernacular domestic architecture in Kerala since 1947 (Independence of India from colonial rule) and identify the changes and analyses the reasons behind these changes. The study focuses on the gradual and vernacular architectural developments happened within the study region owing to several factors like social and political reforms and related, government initiated land reforms, migration to other parts of India and to foreign countries in search of better jobs and income, related economic factors, colonisation, change in technology and work expertise, change in materials, change in lifestyle, global exposure through channels and other communication system, climatological factors etc. The vernacular domestic architecture has undergone tremendous transformation owing to these factors and can be identified with specific typologies emerging. The major questions posed here are, 1. Can visual memory of Vernacular transferred to the contemporary architecture be considered vernacular or even designed vernacular? 2. What is the essence of Vernacular? Can we decipher the Diacritical mass that makes something remain vernacular and something cross the borderline? 3· Vernacular is ever evolving. Is there a stop point for a continuing vernacular construction practice? How do we define the tipping point, if any?
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Informal Structures: Vernacular Spatial Responses To The Industrial Corridor In Indonesia's Main Rice Producer Regency, Karawang West Java
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Kurniawan, KR
Karawang Regency in West Java is one of Indonesian main rice producer regions whose economic activities growth rapidly. However, the concern of many people is that the development failed to anticipate the gap between traditional vernacular communities is" who conduct agricultural activities and the new industrial corridor that is formed along the southern part of Cikampek Toll-road that creates environmental and social problems in recent years. The southern industrial sites where national international manufactured brandings are produced, imported, and distributed are more developed than the northern area. This unequal development creates a disparity inside the regency. Not only industrial estates threaten agricultural land-uses, but also flooding is now a regular disaster in Karawang and endangers the historic settlements and production of paddy-fields. Vast areas lack proper planning and human resources development. These factors race in parallel with social issues like migration and unbalance opportunities between native and newcomers from outside. Also the impact of modern lifestyles and mechanization are additional threats. The intention of this paper is to raise peoples' concern about the sustainability of the vernacular settlement in Karawang which is encroached step by step by industrial estate and modern capitalist developments. 'Informal structures' is a title given to the Karawang Native spatial responses which are created from Native informal economic activities like small eateries, simple boarding houses for laborers, and motorcycles used for public transport. To investigate the phenomena of informal structures in Karawang, this paper will look at from aspects of vernacular communities, urban-architectural structures, authoritarian systems and industrial capitalism through the fourfold intersection of people, place, power and money. The absence of local community involvement in the mainstream development has denied the importance of local initiative and knowledge capacity. Vernacularity, in this case, is transformed into an informal social system that is developed through resistance of kampongs culture against urban capitalist development.
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Vernacular Architecture Inner Baduy Community In Cibeo Village As Representation Of Creativity And Innovation Responding To The Nature
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010) Loupias, HH
Baduy traditional community consists of two groups, namely Inner Baduy and Outer Baduy. Inner Baduy people live in the restricted villages Cibeo, Cikertawana and Cikeusik, Banten province, Indonesia. They have a mystical belief and strong tradition, including the concept of building house and settlement. They believe in supra natural power. One important rules is not allowed to build buildings using materials and tools of modern technology products. Their building stand on some wooden stilts. The stilts stand on stones as function to support the weight of the building and set the building floor flat. They also forbidden to change the building site conditions, such as by way of flattened or excavated of ground. Buildings should adjust to the conditions of its site. The building made from natural materials such as wood, bamboo, palm fiber and so on. They use wood and bamboo construction, using bamboo pegs and wooden and palm-fiber rope. Construction techniques that make buildings resistant earthquake because construction is not rigid, flexible and able to absorb the shocks of the earthquake. Bamboo pegs use when two woods or construction in wet condition, when they are dried the joins becomes stronger. Another important building is leuit that serves as a place to store rice. Leuit stand on some stilts but its size smaller than dwelling house. Leuit located separately from the location of the settlement. To prevent the rats entered the leuit, at the top of the pillars mounted horizontally circular board. In general, the techniques used by traditional Inner Baduy community creativity and innovation, responding to the material and the nature. showed their creativity and innovation, responding to the material and the nature
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New Machine Vernacular: Remote Building Devices, Digital/Cultural Accommodation, And Technology’s Renewed Humanitarian Agenda
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Shaffer, M
Contemporary advancements in mobile technologies and computer-aided fabrication systems have signaled the plausibility of remote construction devices in our near future. Semi-autonomous building-making machines capable of quickly (and continuously) erecting housing, architecturally dependent micro economies, and emergency urbanisms, represent our enormous technological potential to better the lives of an estimated 33 million people currently living in I.D.P. status around the world. In addition to homes and livelihoods, Tectonic Machines, as digital-mechanical extensions of our human sensibilities with regards to building, might also address the cultural and communal alienation of camp-bound I.D.P.s through extreme accommodation in producing vernacular forms and building types. In fact, the success of these humanitarian-centric machines will not be measured through an accounting of their industrial efficiency, but by their variable capabilities towards recreating aesthetically relevant replacement communities to carry functioning cultural systems and temporary economies, rather than mere logistics-based holding camps. These new machine's sensing, “informed", communicative, and freed from subjugation to the assembly line, must be devised to communally design and deliver a great variety of architectural forms that are environmentally fit, culturally accommodating, and spontaneously familiar (not necessarily new), in their appropriateness. In this scenario of techno-environmental mediation, a whole range of future vernaculars might evolve and develop as a comingling of old traditions and state-of-the-art machineries, local materials and global technologies, community-generated instinct and experienced formal practices. In addition to these topics, this paper will report on the development of a specific Tectonic Machine currently being designed for use in humanitarian relief situations and of the essential role vernacular accommodation plays in that development. This project has evolved from a digitally controlled casting system into something with the character and capabilities of a robotic collaborator or construction probe that learns, informs, and evolves design and construction in dialogue/partnership with architects and displaced communities
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The Traditional Courtyard House Of Central And Southern Sardinia: Methodological Hypothesis For The Typo Log I Cal And Performance Renovation Of “Casa Demurtas” In Escolca (Cagliari, Sardinia)
(2010-12) Scolaro, AM; Quattrone, G
The genius loci of vernacular architecture allows one to understand the intimate relationship which folk buildings establish with the site by responding to local environmental conditions1 . In its numberless expressions, vernacular architecture is strongly characterized by technical aspects, related to the community's material culture and socio-cultural evolution, and typological aspects, which very diverse buildings share in relation to spatial and functional organization and dwelling patterns. It is widely agreed that, to understand vernacular architecture, one must not prescind from the understanding of traditional construction techniques and building materials, and analysis of typological features. Typology, in fact, responds to the environmental and climatic features of place, economy, culture, local availability of resources and construction techniques, which have developed within local craftsmanship (Kelbaugh, 1990). The present need for preservation of architectural heritage calls for reflection on the dwelling opportunities that some vernacular rural building types could still provide. Once closely related to the agro-pastoral life and economy, they may still be able to provide high-quality life standards. By focusing on a case study of a "courtyard house” of Southern Sardinia, this paper attempts to test whether, and with which technological and typological adjustments, this typology can meet contemporary dwelling needs as well as current technical and environmental requirements. The paper presents ongoing research which puts forward a hypothesis for the renovation of "Casa Demurtas”, in Escolca, and proposes a methodology that considers construction and typology as possible keys to the reading of the building, in order to re-establish the lost connection between architectural making, materials manufacturing and building techniques development. The final goal is to assess the method's validity for its prospective application to other local contexts
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Brunei Kampong Ayer: An Analysis Of The Structure And The Conditions Of 183 Evolution Of A Borneo Malay Urbanism
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Leblanc, R
For the past 15 years Kampong Ayer, Brunei's famous water villages and former empire's capital has been left to decay slowly. Debates about its future are held far from its inhabitants and away from Brunei’s population that all have their roots in it. This paper attempts to show that this static phase of the village history, with centralized external forces holding its development and planning its redevelopment, has not occurred during 1300 years of history. This does not follow the traditional pattern of urban development of the Vernacular Southeast Asian Coastal Cities [VSEACC], thus any decision made with this new process will dramatically change the face of Kampong Ayer. I argue that Kampong Ayer is an example of a unique type of city that existed during the historical period from the 7th century to the end of the 20th century. The raison d'etre of these cities were to be polities and trading centres, connected with outside world, points of exchange between people, goods, ideas, between seas, rivers and land. There is no research in the urban discipline about the structure of the VSEACC, I propose to use the anthropological model of urban definition developed by 0'Connor(i983) as framework of analysis of its structure and evolution. As he postulates, in Southeast Asia, urban fabrication is a corollary of social structures. To describe the urban form it is then necessary to understand these structures and spatialise them. This will set the background for a brief sketch of the history of Brunei Kampong
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The Sabarmati Story: Memory Of Water And Notions Of Place
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Bharat, G; Khanwalkar, S
An eco-semiotic perspective explains how it exists and gets transformed in four stages: stage zero being wilderness, one - interpreting, identifying, describing, nature two - material interpretation, translation, and production of nature, and three - virtual nature (as represented in the classical and formal arts for instance). A vernacular tradition may be understood as situated in stage one, wherein people convert the physical proximity to nature into a space replete with meaning and association. In a recent interdisciplinary workshop at CEPT University, India we explored the semiotically constructed notions of space and geography in villages on either side of the Sabarmati River in Gujarat. The presence of the river has particular topographical and spatial impacts on the region, and a number of myths and stories have been developed around its presence. What is interesting is that the river has been dammed, has now nearly dried and patterns of life and livelihood along its banks have significantly changed. The myths however remain, and have become ingrained in the settlement and landscape through built symbols such as temples, shrines and other religious iconography or more elusively, in the oral narrative traditions of the local people. These icons and narratives on nature take on the responsibility of being repositories of a vernacular worldview constructed around associations with the river, even when the essence of the myths i.e. the river is no longer present
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Weaving Architecture: A Study Of Women’s Role In The Vernacular Architecture
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Ealdama, AC; Munoz, KAA; Pernia, MP
The aspect of gender in the study and analysis of vernacular architecture has often been overlooked for more popular categories such as methods of construction, motifs and ornamentation. But gender being in itself a social and cultural construct, becomes an essential, even basic notion to which architecture should be studied. It provides yet another contextual framework that will bring understanding to the socio-cultural dynamics and the power relations that inform architecture as a whole. The study is focused on the weaving communities of the Northern Cordillera tribes of the Philippines as case studies, as it primarily establishes women's status, their economic and cultural role in these indigenous societies. As weaving is an activity closely associated with women, the paper attempts to shed light on the correlation between gender roles and the spatial organization within the domestic setting, and the extent of women's participation and involvement in the decision-making process of building the home and ultimately the community. A survey among the households in the Cordillera shows how interior spaces in indigenous houses and community spaces in traditional settlements reflect how gender has become a factor in the appropriation of both private and public spaces
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The Otu: A ‘Free Space’ In Balkrishna Doshi’s Aranya Settlement
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Kaza, K
An Otla is a vernacular element that occurs in some traditional Gujarati homes. It has many variations known by many names in other parts of India, but generally performs the same function: it marks the transition from street to house, usually with a change in elevation, and often with a change in material. According to architect Balkrishna Doshi, it serves as the meeting place of the sacred (house) and the profane (street). It serves as a space where neighbors meet informally, and completes the street and the house, bestowing upon each a unique character. This paper will discuss Dr. Doshi's Aranya housing settlement in Indore, India, focusing on the otla of the Economically Weak Sectors (EWS) houses. The paper will analyze and compare examples of EWS otla to determine the extent .to which design and functional divrsty pervade this common element. It will examine the extent to which Aranya's otla introduce new ideas, uses, and forms to a traditional element. The paper will also discuss the role of the otla within the context of the larger settlement, particularly the way in which it creates a unique street character for the EWS neighborhoods. In examining these issues, I will consider Dr. Doshi's Aranya settlement to be an unusual instance of 'designed vernacular'. While his EWS demonstration housing constitutes a fine example of an architect-designed vernacular infused with modernity, the majority of EWS houses were built without the involvement of an architect. Builders constructed them according to resident's needs and the spatial and programmatic restrictions of the site. Because Aranya is a sites-and-services settlement, some amount of freedom was granted to residents within the tight control of its master plan. This freedom, I will argue, manifests itself most intensely within the small space of the otla.
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Managing The Threat To The Los’ Vernacular Quality In Java, Indonesia1
(Faculty of Architecture University of Moratuwa, 2010-12) Saraswati, T
The tobacco plantation in the area of Klaten Regency (Central Java) and Jember Regency (East Java) has many huge barns which dominate the surrounding landscape since the year of 1850s, named Los. This Los is for drying tobacco. The Los(es) can be found in remote area in the villages; such as in Bendo Gantungan village within Gayamprit tobacco plantation in Klaten Regency; and in Ajong village within Ajong Gayasan tobacco plantation in Jember Regency. Both areas of tobacco plantations are under the management of PTPN X enterprise (government's enterprise). It was confirmed from previous research of Los in Klaten Regency that the Los has high vernacular values, not only from its organization of space, but also from its form, its local materials, and its local techniques. But the vernacular quality of Los is threatened by the nowadays situation we never expect before. For instance, the global change of the climate makes the wind blows more severe. This has been damaging many Loses in Jember Regency due to the light materials the Loses have which could not be saved from the harm of harsh wind. The light materials apply to the main structure of the Loses are from bamboo materials. Moreover, there were also some Loses which accidentally burnt out because of their vulnerable materials to the fire. In addition, there is a Los in Klaten Regency in which its main structure now was changed from bamboo piles to reinforced concrete columns, and so forth. It is unavoidably expected that in the future the vernacular quality of Los will be ruined. This paper will explore the possible ways to reconstruct the Los in the future with very little destruction to its vernacular quality. This means that the vernacular traditions of the Los should be continued as much as possible.