An Analysis of unconventional modern domestic environments in urban contexts

Abstract

Sri Lanka, is an island with a wide coastal belt and an indulging landscape with lush greenery. Its5 strategic position in the Indian Ocean made her rich in contacts with the outside world. The diverse influences from India, Southeast Asia, East Asia and also from colonization have been interpreted in historical, social, cultural and especially in physical contexts through out its5 civilization.

With passage of time due to many known and unknown reasons most of these evidences are not visible today. Urban domestic architecture is one such. Current visible evidences of urban domestic architecture mainly have roots in colonial Ceylon.

Although we are short of Portuguese domestic architecture in Sri Lanka we do have a considerable amount of features from Dutch influence. Baroque gables, verandas and courtyards with spaces interconnected within could be mainly figured as Dutch introductions to new urban centers.

But the British kept a maximum possible garden abounded with a large garden at front. These elite residential areas within cities were very similar to country houses in Britain and were far away from architecturally domestic urban quality.

Ending the colonial rule independence movement began. Political, social and cultural winds blew through the continent effecting the sciences and arts as well. People were searching for their own identities and in parallel we were looking for a “Sri Lankan identity55. By this time our architects who were caught up in modem movement thinking during their study stays in western schools were back in homeland. The so-called modern movement was the international trend, the style of freedom representing the independence.

The principles of clarity, purity and completeness introduced by modern movement were slowly rejecting by Asians. The process of continuous growing which, the Asians were adhered in ‘living5 could not be accommodated by those specific designs.

We are spontaneous. We do not take much care about a clear beginning or on a destination. We move in time spontaneously. Our ideas, needs and desires change with time within where we are. We just happen to live accommodating what we have; accommodating surrounding. This spontaneousness within our cultural setting backed by Buddhist philosophy should possess our identity in architecture.