The Design Gesture

Category: City Architecture

Le Corbusier’s Chandigarh City: India in the Search of Unique Identity
India, a culturally and traditionally rich nation today, has been prominent since ancient times. The Britishers invaded India with the greed of robbing the rich. They ruled for about 300 years, yet they couldn’t break the nation, though India (Hindustan) lost its identity.
“The identity lost, the hopes lost,
Nonetheless, Chandigarh Vision provided an answer.”
Chandigarh city
Chandigarh: The Beginning
After the independence, the country’s Muslim population was protected from the Hindu majority by leaving colonial masters, who reserved the eastern and northwest regions for their use. It took much longer than 73 days for many of the 100 million or so Muslims who were dispersed throughout India to relocate to these areas, which are now the countries of Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Sir Cyril Radcliffe divided the state of Punjab between India and Pakistan when he drew the borders for the two nations; Pakistan kept control of Lahore, the state capital. Following this defeat, Punjab established a new state capital that would meet the state’s logistical needs and unmistakably declare to the world that a new, modern, wealthy, and independent India had come.
Image 1: The Newspaper Archive about Chandigarh’s rise on Saturday, April 10, 1948.
The Punjabi government went to establish the new capital at Chandigarh, in the north of Delhi. The First Prime Minister of independent India, Jawaharlal Nehru explained, “From existing encumbrances of old towns and old traditions, let this be a new town, symbolic of the past…. an expression of the nation’s faith in the future.”. The Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru of independent India wished to imagine the new capital as progress, and modernity.
With the development of a new capital in Punjab, the American architects Albert Mayer and Matthew Nowicki were approached. Sadly, due to the sudden death of Nowicki, Matthew also dropped off the project. Once hope was in the air. The Project Directors searched Europe, and Le Corbusier was approached for the project, with Pierre Jeanneret as a site architect.
Image 2: The photograph at Le Corbusier’s Office in Chandigarh city during the planning alongside to the left to right is Pierre Jeanneret
Le Corbusier’s approach to planning was similar to that of the previous plan by Matthew and Mayer. The change was the city’s shape, insisting on curved roads, it was all rectilinear with clean and crisp grids. The modernist approach to city planning is about functionality. As a result, the roads were reworked, and the hierarchy. The city planning observed arterials to pedestrian and bicycle lanes, as 7Vs. This became the sector with a green open space following the north-south direction, while the commercial in the east-west direction. These plans reflect the Garden City Movement and the architect’s concept from the Ville Radieuse. The Ville Radieuse is the solution to free ground pedestrian movement without traffic congestion.
Image 3: Le Corbusier’s Chandigarh Map in the year 1951
The roads define the boundaries of the sectors. The sectors in conjunction with the roads indulged in various public functions. The sectors were further divided into four quadrants. The quadrants included housing. This resulted in a safe household with their schools, shopping centers, businesses, and public spaces.
The planned city incorporated residential housing into thirteen categories based on rank and income. yet, every category had a letter identifying the designer and a number indicating its position in the financial structure, but they were all the same in their contemporary, geometric simplicity. Along with perforated screens and, in a few cases, verandahs, the deep overhangs and recesses used for shading provided the main visual appeal in the otherwise monolithically rectangular buildings.
Image 4: Various Photographs of Chandigarh between 1951 and 1965
Image 5: Various Photographs of Chandigarh between 1951 and 1965
The original approach had the capitol complex as the center of the city from the drawings in 1951. Then the change came when Le Corbusier planned the artificial hills between the Capitol Complex and the city, breaking the whole visuality. The urban isolation was there, the Capitol Complex has its own aesthetical and spatial appeal. Le Corbusier combined the traditional classical and Indian elements into the physicality to have a concrete identity for the city.
Eventually, as per the article published in the BBC, Chandigarh city is one the most successful planned cities with a combination of architecture, culture, and modernization.
Chandigarh: A City of Identity
As the city had to accommodate about 150, 000 during the initial phase, the population is still on the rise. The approach should be able to meet the water and drainage needs based on the climatic conditions which was also a point of consideration. As the city was divided with an axial approach, the development was divided into phases. The initial phase focused on the development of the sectors with some major avenues towards the Capitol complex with a connecting railway, industrial area, and university.
Le Corbusier focused on the Capitol as the head, commercial center, industrial sector, and intellectual center of the city, bringing a biological element to the layout design. He oversaw the city’s architectural direction and created the structures of the Capitol. The senior architectural group’s other three members were responsible for social infrastructure, government housing, municipal buildings, commercial centers, and schools.
To conceal the homogeneity of the sectors, a protected green belt and tree planting were employed. Chandigarh city was viewed as a low-rise, low-density city with a regular traffic pattern to cut expenses. Every significant architect created their style while adhering to a standard design of regular brick and stone box constructions featuring prisons and brise-soleil.
Presently, one of the busiest hubs in the nation, Chandigarh city observes heavy traffic congestion that only gets worse as the city gets more and more urbanized. Over time, the initial stages of constructed bulls and spaces have become outmoded contemporary demands and scenarios.
Chandigarh City: The Contemporary
With the passing of time and the advent of technology, Chandigarh city got its new plan in the year 2015, to meet the need for expansion and growth. However, during these years unplanned development has seen resistance. As planning is indeed, to carry forward the past, Le Corbusier’s Planning will add up to the future planning approach.
The recent urbanization in Chandigarh city has changed the core. The outskirts development of recent times has been adversely affected by various factors such as high rates of land prices, housing shortage, the socio-economic aspect of the city, and growth as a city.
Hence, the smart city approach alters the original plan to suffice the upcoming challenges and needs of the rapidly increasing population. The city has taken steps towards this transformation with transit and people, improving the pedestrian walking experience and public spaces.
Given the complexity and high technological requirements of modern design, it could have been challenging to take on such a large project alone today. Le Corbusier, however, managed construction-related matters alone to keep others from influencing his theories through conversation. He was hardly a climate expert when it came to burning winds, the monsoon, and uninsulated concrete. Like this, at the municipal level, zoning regulations and the solitude of streets and avenues deter intensive urban activity. The city is a succession of images, its rigid, inurbane nature.
Image 6: Chandigarh Map- City Master Plan 2031
However, Chandigarh city is significantly more for what it might have been than for what it is now, much like most of his innovative ideas that have inspired countless architects throughout the years.
October 29, 2024
Architecture of Montreal: Alluring Marvels of the City
Montreal is called for Mount Royal, a triple-peaked hill in the city’s centre, which sits on an island in the Saint Lawrence River. The cobblestone lanes of Old Montreal, where there are over 50 National Historic Sites of Canada, bear witness to the city’s past as a French colony.
Montreal recently hosted the 1967 National Exhibition (often known as Expo 67), which provided an opportunity to create more experimental buildings that pushed the frontiers of modern architecture. Two of the city’s most well-known architectural marvels are Moshe Safdie’s Habitat 67 and Buckminster Fuller’s Biosphere.
The Architecture of Montreal
The architecture of Montreal, Quebec, Canada is defined by the juxtaposition of ancient and contemporary, as well as a wide range of architectural styles, as well as the heritage of successive colonisation by the French and the British, as well as the proximity to modern architecture to the south. Montreal had fortifications, similar to Quebec City, but they were dismantled between 1804 and 1817.
Montreal was Canada’s industrial and financial capital for nearly a century and a half. The structures featured industries, elevators, warehouses, mills, and refineries, all of which have left a cultural and architectural impact, particularly in the Downtown and Old Montreal areas. Many historic structures in Old Montreal have been restored to their former glory, including the majestic 19th-century headquarters of the major Canadian banks on Saint Jacques Street (formerly known as Saint James Street).
Montreal has a few prominent Art Deco buildings, including Ernest Cormier’s Université de Montréal main building on Mount Royal’s northern slope and the Aldred Building at Place d’Armes, a historic square in Old Montreal.
Buildings representative of several major periods in Montreal architecture, the Gothic Revival Notre-Dame Basilica, the New York Life Building, Montreal’s first high-rise, the Pantheon-like Bank of Montreal head office, Canada’s first bank, the aforementioned Aldred Building (1931), and the International style 500 Place D’Armes are all located around Place d’Armes.
Some Marvolous Architecture of Montreal
Montreal is a fantastic tourist attraction since it has endured centuries of architectural evolution with the impact of several colonisations. It also features structures that can display the change in architectural style over time.
What will follow is a list of monuments every architect must see at least once.
Montreal World Trade Centre
Location: 747 Rue du Square-Victoria, Montreal, QCArchitect: Arcop
The World Trade Centre in Montreal is referred to be a “horizontal skyscraper” by many architectural references. A glass canopy was used to connect a whole city block of old buildings. This results in a big indoor village where tourists can see some of Montreal’s most well-known architecture all year. The firm Arcop was responsible for this stunning design.
The building, often known as a horizontal skyscraper, was completed in 1992. It is a shopping mall, a hotel, and a business complex in Montreal. By articulating several tiny Victorian-era business buildings into a greater form, the complex was able to bring them together. It is an example of historic and modern architecture in a glass atrium, with an aesthetic of a classic late-nineteenth-century looking edifice.
City Hall
Source
Location: 275 Notre-Dame St E, Montreal, QC
Montreal’s City Hall is among Canada’s most magnificent buildings and is widely regarded as one of the best examples of Napoleon III-style architecture.
The municipal hall, also known as the Hotel de Ville de Montreal in French, was built between 1872 and 1878. It is a five-story structure in the Old Montreal neighbourhood built in the Second Empire Architectural Style. It was created for the city of Montreal’s seat of government.
The structure’s interior was damaged by a huge fire in 1922, leaving just the outer walls surviving. Architect Louis Parent oversaw the building’s renovation, which included constructing a new steel framework within the shell that had been left intact. The roof of the municipal hall was designed in the Beaux-Arts style, which originated in Paris.
Sun Life Building
Photo by RTF
Location: 1155 Rue Metcalfe, Ville-Marie Montreal, QC
The Sun Light Building was built in 1931 and was the first structure of its kind in the city. It was the largest structure in the British Empire, and its use as the country’s gold reserve during World War 2 cemented its historical significance. Even if you are unfamiliar with the history of the Sun Life Building, its towering design conveys its significance.
Built between 1913 and 1931, it is a stunning example of Fine Arts architecture. It was the site of Operation Fish, which saw Britain transfer its gold reserves from war-torn Europe to a vault beneath the Sun Life Building during World War II. To prevent detection, the gold was delivered in fish-themed crates.
Habitat 67
Source
Location: 2600 Av Pierre-Dupuy, Montreal, QC
Habitat 67, a mind-bending housing complex designed by architect Moshe Safdie, is one of Montreal’s most iconic instances of brutalist architecture. Within six months after its premiere at Expo 67, more than 50 million people rushed to view the building, which was completed in 1967.
Habitat 67’s commercial failure has turned out to be a blessing in disguise over time. It failed to revolutionise cheap housing in the way that Safdie envisioned, according to critics. Nonetheless, it is a one-of-a-kind residential complex that aided Safdie’s professional debut.

The Point-a-Calliere
Photo by RTF
The Pointe-a-Calliere is a public museum dedicated to the archaeology and history of old Montreal, was opened in 1992 to commemorate the city’s 350th anniversary. It is made up of three pavilions, each of which represents a distinct period in the city’s colonial history.
The museum houses relics from the Montreal region’s first peoples, as well as exhibits on the coexistence of French and British governments and their impact on the territory over the centuries. Every year, over 350,000 people visit this museum, which has won over fifty national and international accolades.
Arsenal Montreal
Photo by AD
Arsenal, a 19th-century old shipyard transformed into a huge, echoing, and interesting display for modern art from around the world, with much of its industrial character preserved, is likely the largest art venue in Montreal, with more than 80,000 square feet.
The complex’s director, Jean-Françoise Bélisle, describes it as “a mad playground,” adding that Montreal is waking to modern art and that “this is a magical hybrid of the kinds of private foundations and public institutions I’ve seen across the world.” Given the calibre of artists in Quebec, it’s incredible that Montreal has never had this kind of worldwide outlet.
Canadian Centre of Architecture
The CCA is a modern expression of Montreal style, the idea of Seagram heiress-turned-architect Phyllis Lambert, who persuaded her father to engage Ludwig Mies van der Rohe to construct the family firm’s Seagram Building in New York
City in the 1950s.
The study centre, museum, and lecture venue, designed by architect Peter Rose with Lambert’s input, is made of local grey-stone and birch, all the better to complement the historic building at its heart: a 19th-century mansion that Lambert saved against vehement civic opposition in the 1970s when urban renewal was destroying the city in the misguided name of progress. Urban rejuvenation so often equals urban removal was told by Lambert, who also created Heritage Montreal, a powerful preservation organisation.
Grand Bibliothèque
The Grande Bibliothèque (or Great Library), one of Montreal’s most popular structures in recent years, is a civic gem that architect Phyllis Lambert describes as “amazing inside—simple but lovely.” The building, designed by Croft-Pelletier Architects, Gilles Guité, and Patkau Architects, has giant yellow-birch louvres enclosing the reading rooms, as well as open stairways that hover level after floor, switching back and forth like origami unfolding.
Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal
The Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal, which opened in the early 1960s and is located in a modernist glass temple, is the torchbearer for 20th- and 21st-century creative expression. It also has a fantastic restaurant, Le Contemporain, where one may unwind after viewing works by a diverse range of foreign artists, including James Turrell, Vik Muniz, Claude Tousignant, and Jean-Paul Riopelle.
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
Photo by AD
The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts is home to a number of mind-expanding galleries, which are spread across numerous buildings and wings built over the period of more than a century. There’s a section dedicated to Canadian Abstract Expressionists from the twentieth century, as well as a decorative-arts pavilion that spans centuries, all stretched across multiple open levels connected by terrazzo ramps and stairways.

Palais Des Congrès de Montréal
Many tourists would pass on a tour of a convention centre, but Montreal’s gleaming Palais de Congrès is definitely worth the trip. The 1980s mod behemoth is enveloped in hundreds of colourful glass panels that revolutionise its sunlit interior into an enchanting kaleidoscope of blues, greens, red, pinks, and yellows in the daylight hours and into a bizarrely beautiful lantern after dark.
A centrepiece of the bustling Quartier International de Montréal—an urban spectacle that civic leader Phyllis Lambert calls “great stuff, with a spirit rather like New York’s High Line”— Tétreault, Parent, Languedoc et Associés, Saia et Barbarese Architects, and Dupuis, Dubuc et Associés were among the architects who worked on the project.
W Montréal
Photo by AD
The W Montréal is accommodated in a heritage building that was built for the Banque du Canada. It is chic, simplistic, and elegant. It is a luxury anchor, ideally positioned in Montréal’s Quartier International, and buzzing with the dorée jeunesse at all hours of the day and night.
October 29, 2024
Making a Home in Southeast Asia: Essential Tips and Tricks
Introduction
Sandy golden beaches, tropical forests, and perennial rivers with paddy terrains in sultry heat create a satisfying canvas of the great Southeast Asian region. One can easily distinguish as well as picture SEA, consisting of many early civilizations of the world, not only because of the great heritage these treasure but also the culture and rituals instilled in the people of this region.
Living in Southeast Asia
We, as people, are carriers of many innovations including art, values, and architecture of course. In a region where stones are worshiped, water is sacred, food is more than just fuel for the body, houses hold a special emotional status for many people here. It’s not just a place to retire at night for a good night’s sleep, but they somehow breathe with the dwellers, inspire families, welcome tired souls happily, and whatnot.
Be it the Grand Palace of Bangkok or the house on the stilts of Myanmar, the feeling instilled in the person residing is the same. The houses built here are more like static humans. A separate space for stories to recite, to cook fresh aroma, and to change attire all jam-packed in the same old house.
Uniqueness can be more recognized when the houses we live in are traditional, raw, and stylized with local materials. A village in South Odisha bordering Andhra Pradesh houses the Bonda tribe majorly. Primarily erected with mud and capped with clay-tile roofs homes in the village of Bhaliapadar have a distinct character. Usually, one room is used as a living area to sleep in, and the other as a kitchen. They do also have ample space for an elevated platform or verandah.
Upon the verandah wooden staffs stand to support the roof. Although small, they are simple and minimalistic. Even some more evolved tribes like the Santhals and Gandabas in the region have kept the ancient traditions alive, which is evident in their homes. And since all the houses in a locality are similar in size and character, they directly or indirectly shape the identity of the place. Scarlett with a tint of ochre painted on the outer walls of the houses by Santhals along with thin strokes of blue for sheer detailing.
Entirely or largely depending on agriculture as a profession and living it impacts houses in South East Asia highly. For example, in traditional Thai housing, we can witness the bamboo raised floor to avoid floods. They should be able to accommodate both goods and animals. Moreover, different kinds of bamboo, wood, and prefabricated panels were used in Siamese villages. A typical Siamese wooden dwelling has separate rooms organized under a single, huge roof. Before you step into the house, a water jar is kept at the bottom of the steps to wash feet; and all the rooms oversee a central platform. Houses were set to expand for future generations, that is extra rooms for younger ones of the family.
The social congregation is an essential aspect of life in the island countries of Southeast Asia. Some ethnic groups in Indonesia practice such traditions even now, through their housing systems. For instance, the Karo Batak house is a meeting shelter for the bachelors of the village, who use it as a recreational space. Resembling the basic pyramid structure, the Karo Batak house is thatched with ijuk, and the roofs are decorated with painted interwoven split bamboo. Perhaps, buildings erected by this community are very complex and have highly intricate details. Thus, a few renovated heritage resorts adapted the styles of Karo Batak houses in their cottages.
The sanctity and sacredness of lifestyle can today be clearly seen in villages and countryside areas of nations running towards modern systems. In a book named ‘ARCHITECTURE OF SOUTH EAST ASIA’, there is an independent section dedicated to travelogues written in villages for brief periods. One of those encounters talks about the Burmese villages of Meeryoungyai and Nyaung-U, on the banks of Irrawaddy by R. Talbot Kelly.
The author along with his companion experienced traveling with the help of coolies, bullock gharries, and ponies to the serene deep woods. To their surprise, women and young girls carried out the loading and unloading of heavyweights to transfer them from one bumpy ride to the other. The houses or dak had typical features: primarily made of bamboo, however many had eng wood principal timbers all raised on four to six feet long piles to protect them from floods, snakes, and malaria.
Floors weaved out of split bamboo or thatch of elephant grass, or ‘thekke’ or bamboo mats called ‘tayan’. Tayan can serve as walls for modest dwellings, though the walls nearing the streets are usually exposed, displaying the interiors of the house. The domestic arrangements are generally composed of naked young children running and jumping accompanied by pigeons, geese, and poultry underneath the houses. And as dusk hits, the sound of returning bullock gharries and carts meets the sweet aroma of Burmese kitchens. The houses are aligned with each other creating ample roads in between them.
Although strong roots of beliefs, cultures, traditions, and linguistics of more than three hundred fifty ethnic groups reside here, many fast-paced globalization trends compel her to change and match contemporary architecture standards. Since the early twentieth century, the region has experienced many transformations because of the rapid colonization by Westerners. Powerful influences imposed on natives left a non-perishable marvel of colonized buildings then.
Streets in old Kolkata have many solid red and white administrative buildings with tall, slender Doric columns. However, if observed closely, westernization has led indigenous construction techniques to take a back seat, and slowly vernacular architecture became sparingly known to even locals, which as a result has deteriorated the climate responsiveness and user-friendliness in our homes.
What we shape is given birth by what shapes us. So, the architecture of tomorrow that we need to design needs to receive and learn from the architecture of yesterday. The vernacular architecture of any place is the specific identity of that area. It’s somewhat related to traditional buildings but vernacular architecture is generally an offspring of the easily available local materials. So to respect this kind of knowledge, architects should thrive and try their best to design a worthy product to live in.
October 29, 2024