1. Introduction:
Laurie Baker Uvaca
I learn my architecture by watching what ordinary people do; in any case it is always the cheapest and simplest because ordinary people do it. They don't even employ builders, the families do it themselves. The job works, you can see it in the old buildings—the way wood lattice work with a lot of little holes filters the light and glare. I'm absolutely certain that concrete frames filled with glass panels is not the answer.
My clients have always been Indian. I've not even had the foreign-returned to deal with, since I work primarily with the poor and I've always wanted to give people what they want and what they need which obviously is all Indian. My feeling as an architect is that you're not after all trying to put up a monument which will be remembered as a 'Laurie Baker Building' but Mohan Singh's house where he can live happily with his family.
Gautam Bhatiya:
Laurie Baker has worked in India for over forty years now. He is one of the very few architects who has had the opportunity and the stamina to work on such a remarkably varied spectrum of projects ranging from fishermen's villages to institutional complexes and from low-cost mud¬housing schemes to low-cost cathedrals. In Trivandrum alone he has built over a thousand houses. Besides this, his work includes forty churches, numerous schools, institutions and hospitals.
It is not only the number of buildings that Laurie Baker has designed and the range of architectural commissions he has executed that sets him apart from other architects. What makes his work even more remarkable is the way in which he draws creative sustenance from the environment in which he works absorbing vernacular patterns of construction and individual styles of living to such a degree that he is able to give his clients the comfort and ease of homes and institutions that are firmly rooted in the soil upon which they stand. All this is done keeping in mind the special needs of those who will inhabit or use these places.
In the designing of these varied projects, Laurie Baker takes half-forgotten vernacular patterns of design and construction from the rural setting to dislocated urban residents whose building choices are often limited to the unsuitable structural concepts discarded in the West. In every building that Baker designs, he asserts the appropriateness of traditional constructions to local conditions, adapting existing locally-available materials and traditional methods to contemporary urban structures.
A recognition of Baker's contribution to architecture has a singular timeliness today. It has come at a time when a questing conscience has provoked—to look inwards, to solutions of its own making. In these circumstances, Baker in India remains a lone protagonist, experimenting singly and quietly in a distant corner of the country and providing information on the causes and results of his numerous architectural interventions.
In both, his work and writings, Baker emphatically rejects the 'inter-national style' that lingers so perniciously in India. The French architect, Le Corbuiser, who designed Chandigarh, spawned a host of acolytes seeking a universally applicable architectural technology. The result of this is seen in the post-fifties buildings of almost every city in India. Baker has never accepted the idea that the multiplicity of human needs and aspirations can be fulfilled by a standard set of design options and materials. He believes that individual needs stem from India's diverse environment, the varying cultural patterns and lifestyles; and he feels that these needs must be met through an architecture which is responsive, uses local materials and expresses itself in many different forms.
In Baker's scheme of things, architecture cannot be transplanted without doing violence to those very needs which it is attempting to meet. When, for example, the introverted patterns of desert architecture are transferred to the fertile landscapes of the Kerala coast, it dislocates traditional patterns of living. Parallels to this may be seen in any mass-housing scheme, when all-too-often, inhabitants are compelled to camp uncomfortably within unsuitable contours and divisions of space.
However, Baker is no conservative. He is at pains to emphasize the fact that living architecture thrives on appropriate assimilation and adaptation. Indeed, its vitality frequently stems from its ability to change and to meet the changing needs and perceptions of its inhabitants. Architecture, like any craft, is an organic, evolving form and traditional patterns are not the rigidly- structured creations of individuals but the collective experience of many generations. Baker's architecture draws inspiration from the work of successive generations of builders, from the imprint of the environment and those who have lived in it. In his the imprint of the environment and those who have lived in it. In his case it happens to be his adopted home state of Kerala in south India.
The building techniques Baker has evolved to suit specific problems of his poorer clients in Kerala is not a formula applicable to all similar situations; and yet, from it stems an entire ideology of architectural practice—a pattern that is revolutionary in its simplicity and its contradiction of the accepted norms of architecture in contemporary India. Baker's work is an effective demonstration of his own strength, his own interpretation of tradition, technology and lifestyle.
1. What factors influenced Baker's architecture?
Laurie Baker Uvaca
Distinctive architectural styles were not designed by some famous ancient architect who decreed that a certain style will be used in Japan and a certain other style will be used in Peru and yet another style in Punjab. The upturned, horned roofs of buildings as found in Kerala, China and Japan are the direct result of the people of those places making use of the most common, plentiful, useful material: bamboo—to house and protect them from natural enemies such as sun, rain, hurricanes and wind. A completely different set of styles has evolved in hot, dry, treeless, desert areas, as in parts of Egypt,
Laurie Baker at Work
Iran and India; in almost every district in the world these natural styles have grown to the patterns that could be seen in the first half of the twentieth century.
Our 'backward' ancestors had learned how to live with and cope with the problems of climate. They had learned that a pitched or a sloping roof lessened the effects of all these hazards. They knew the movements of air currents and placed their wall openings almost at ground level. They knew that hot air rises and allowed it to travel upwards from the low eaves to the openings at the end of the high ridge. They understood and applied principles of insulation; their roofing materials formed hollow cellular protective layers and their storage spaces provided insulation from the midday sun. They had understood that wall surfaces can absorb and retain just as much heat as a roof surface, so they kept these walls as small in area as possible and never left them unprotected. They knew that eye-strain from working out in the sun could be alleviated by rest in an area where glare was eliminated and they used smooth, hard, light-coloured surfaces sparingly and left the natural materials—wood, brick, stone—exposed. Their practical knowledge of the properties of these differing building materials was amazing. They knew, for instance, how to design their timber and wood work to avoid warping, twising and cracking.
Gautam Bhatiya:
Laurie Baker's philosophy of architecture is inextricably bound with his experiences of childhood and youth in England, and later, in the Pithoragarh district of Uttar Pradesh in the Himalays where he lived for sixteen years.
One of his earliest architecture-related memories is that of being baffled by the differences in the styles of houses at the seaside, where he went on holidays, and that of houses in the mountains, where he lived.
2. Is Laurie Baker the founder of new architecture?
Laurie Baker Uvaca
I am these days sometimes quoted as an expert or an authority on 'appropriate' or 'intermediate' technology and although I did not know it at the time, it was my life and experiences at Pithoragarh that taught me 'appropriate and intermediate' technology....
To me, this Himalayan domestic architecture was a perfect example of vernacular architecture. Simple, efficient, inexpensive.... As usual this delightful, dignified housing demonstrated hundreds of years of building delightful, dignified housing demonstrated hundred of years of building research on how to cope with local materials, how to
cope with local climate hazards and how to accommodate the local social pattern of living. It dealt with incidental difficult problem of how to build on a steeply sloping site, or how to cope with earthquakes and how to avoid landsliding areas and paths. The few examples of attempts to modernize housing merely demonstrated, only too clearly, our modern conceit and showed how very foolish we are when we attempt to ignore or abandon these hundreds of years of'research' in local building materials...
Gautam Bhatia:
The direct and honest use of local materials created its own expression of structural necessity, of economic restraint. Confronted with building materials like rock, mud, laterite and cow-dung, Baker's architectural practice in the Himalayas was anything but conventional. His education at the Birmingham School of Architecture and the skills acquired during his professional apprenticeship in England became decidedly insignificant in the austere mountain environment in which he found himself. He realized that the local people knew how to use materials more effectively than he did.
It was a very unusual sight to see an English architect, with an urban background, working with and learning from mountain tribesmen and village masons, and using indigenous materials for building. However, it proved to be a richly fruitful alliance. Baker learnt to adapt his skills and training to the needs with which he was now faced. He built schools, hospitals and community buildings, all of which ran on a self-supporting basis.
The strength and the organic resilience of
Badker's early architecture was the direct outcome of his own strength and resilience. And, in turn, the years of continuous settlement in a single place gave his designs a quality of rootedness. The lessons he derived from this experience in the Himalayas and the architectural principles he learnt there remained with him even when, years later, he resumed practice in Trivandrum.
The Bakers left Pithorgarh in 1963 and moved to a similar hill area in central Kerala. They settled in a remote village, Vakamon, inhabited by tribal people and Tamil migrants, and continued to work in much the same way as they had in Pithoragarh— building schools and leprosy treatment centres, using their skills and training for the benefit of the local people, and learning local skills as they did so.
In Trivandrum, Baker applied all that he had learnt to a wider clientele—building homes for the middle class and institutions for a wide range of organizations. Today, over a thousand families in the Trivandrum district live in Baker's houses; and the evolution of his style can be traced through his work in and around this city.
As he worked, Baker began to understand the essential simplicity that is at the base of effective, living architecture. He refined his style, stepping away from unnecessary accoutrements. A chance encounter with Mahatma Gandhi at the beginning of his career seems to have made a great impact of his architecture, as Gandhi's ideologies were to influence him in all his work.
Though this is not the single most persuasive influence in Baker's life, in the course of several discourses of the Mahatma, Baker imbibed the meaning of one of his most persistent messages—that change in post-independent India can be brought about
only through education and revival of the
local crafts and cottage industries; that is,
real independence can be only achieved
by self-reliance and by encouraging local
craftsmanship. Unfortunately, much too
often this message has been lost in the
muddy waters of politics and the race to
modernize India. Thus Baker's work is more relevant particularly now than ever before.
3. The Gandhi influence
Laurie Baker Uvaca:
I believe that Gandhiji is the only leader in our country who has talked consistently with common-sense about the building needs of our country. What he said many years ago is even more pertinent now. One of the things he said that impressed me and has influenced my thinking more than anything else was
that the ideal houses in the ideal village will be built of materials which are all found within a five-mile radius of the house.
What clearer explanation is there of what appropriate building technology means than this advice by Gandhiji! I confess that as a young architect, born, brought up, educated and qualified in the West, I though at first Gandhiji's ideal was a bit 'far-fetched' and I used to argue to myself that of course he probably did not intend us to take this ideal too literally.
But now, in my seventies and with forty years of building behind me, I have come to the conclusion that he was right, literally word for word, and that he did not mean that there could be exceptions. If only I had not been so proud and sure of
my learning and my training as an architect, I could have seen clearly wonderful examples of Gandhiji's wisdom all round me throughout the entire period I lived in the Pithoragarh district.
Gautam Bhatia:
His qualities emanate from a deeply-held belief that each piece of work is an offering to God and must, therefore, not only be without flaw, but must not violate God's creation in the making. From this stems a natural inclination to use the materials cautiously, leading to a conservationist approach to design. Baker's deep convictions and the persistent intentions supported this architectural expression.
4. The contextual relevance of Baker's work
Laurie Baker Uvaca:
There is a general belief that India is wealthy, both in simple basic building materials and in potential labour forces. Then there is a firm unyielding belief that all this talk of 'low-cost building' should not be 'for the poor' but for all. Furthermore, although we possess a certain amount of more sophisticated building materials, such supplies are comparatively small and must be used to maximum advantage. For example, we possess steel but the fact remains that many mechanical industries have a stronger claim on its use than the building industry, which can, if it wants, find substitutes and alternatives.
Gautam Bhatia:
At the turn of the twentieth century, architects genuinely believed that the modern movement would provide new
techniques and new materials to serve the needs of ordinary people. It seemed as if technology could provide a solution to the persistent problem of housing, and it was believed that high-tech buildings would ultimately improve the standard of living for everybody.
However, rapid industrialization only seemed to increase the demand for housing that has now grown to unimaginable proportions. Housing has come to be dominated almost entirely by commercial builders employed by local governments— both of whom look upon a house as a commodity to be produced and sold in large numbers. The once-new technological solutions of the modern movement have fossilized into rigid inflexibility in their hands. The comfort and lifestyle of the individuals for whom the mass-housing schemes are intended are very rarely considered. The result is all-too-visible in cities all over the world. Especially, in Third World countries such as India, as governments struggle to house the ever- increasing numbers of urban dwellers, the inadequacies of the forty-year-old doctrines of modern architecture have been brought more sharply into focus. Moreover, as the gap between available resources and the need for housing has increased, the inflexible sterility of the modern movement has become even more apparent.
Mass-housing and emphasis on the improvementoflivingconditionsisallaresult of the new industrial economy. Humanistic considerations are no longer the primary logic for the evaluation of design. This has led to a break from tradition and given us an increasing number of impersonal, anonymous buildings. Unfamiliarity with this new kind of architecture adversely affects the psyche of the people inhabiting it.
Laurie Baker Uvaca:
The necessity for speed was one of the big factors that contributes to that break with tradition. It probably took a thousand years for us to find out by trial-and-error how to make a mud wall impervious to rain and wind, another thousand years to learn how to keep termites out of it, and another two or three thousand to learn how to build multi-storeyed mud buildings.
Gautam Bhatia:
Though Baker is not a founder, practitioner or product of the modern doctrine in any sense, he was, in own career, demonstrated similar concerns. But, unlike the movement, in his endeavour to improve living conditions architecturally he seeks a purposeful link with tradition.
Baker's work can be viewed as part of a much larger worldwide effort to re¬examine architectural values. In the 1960s, the new architect's rejection of establishment values was an admission that the profession was out of touch with the times. Ordinary human needs to which the modern doctrine was as wholeheartedly committed seemed imprisoned in unfamiliar buildings and surroundings. The increasing inability of government agencies to produce adequate housing led architects in several parts of the developing world to examine architectural priorities. The work of John Turner in Latin America and Hassan Fathy's experience in Egypt paralleled the quiet revolution that Laurie Baker was enacting in India.
Each one sought the development of a contemporary vernacular—a commonly observed, felt and accepted language of building which would be transformed to suit the new requirements. The prevalence of an overriding craft tradition and the need to evolve buildings out of severe economic constraints shifted the emphasis away from technology towards an earthy humanism. Such a transformation required a sharp comprehension of the dual phenomena of tradition and change; and of the need to re-establish the use of traditional construction without the loss of vitality, the vitality, that accompanies change.
5. Is a Modern Indian Architecture Possible?
Laurie Baker Uvaca:
In most countries of the world architects are being accused of failing to produce a modern form of their own previously- distinctive architectural styles. If one or two typical modern buildings from each country could be transported and put down in isolation in a large flat desert, could any of us, even architects, walk from one building to another and say 'Ah! A modern Fijian masterpiece' and 'Wow! Just look at this one—pure Italian' and further on 'My! This is obviously an Indian effort!' A hundred or so years ago we could probably have been successful with such identifications, but there are very grave doubts whether we can do so now.
Does this mean that we have failed in our job?
Fifty years ago (in 1940s) we were taught that a building must have an identity. We could certainly tell by looking at a building whether it was domestic or commercial or industrial and so on. It also had its geographical and cultural characteristics. In India there is an incredible wealth of regional architectural styles, and there is not the faintest possibility of confusing one with another. Even where the same materials have been used for building, the climatic, cultural and regional variations are so great that different methods of construction have been used to produce unique individual styles. Further, these distinctive styles apply not only to big and important buildings but also to the smallest domestic structures. Really we can say that the buildings of any small district are a quintessence of that district's culture and skill.
But these distinctions cannot be found anymore. What has happened?
For one thing—cement. Modern Portland cement came and suddenly our slow, steady, evolutionary building process came to a devastating and tragic halt. Cement and steel were joined in holy matrimony and lo!— their child was this universal anonymous expressionless 'modern architecture' which tells you nothing except that reinforced concrete has been lavishly and brutally used. The saddest thing about it is that reinforced concrete has been lavishly and brutally used. The saddest thing about it is that reinforced concrete is a wonderful material that can do almost everything fantastic and exciting. It can stand, soar, twist, hang, swirl, gyrate, encircle, defy and placate. But we rarely ever let it do any of these exciting things. We merely imitate the building practices of the Dravidians, with their square stone pillars and split stone beams; and when in a very dare-devil mood we cantilever out the beam-ends to an uncomfortable length, we think we are really and truly 'modern'.
Of course, we have a third deadly material, glass—with which we fill in all the holes. The result of this modern but static style of architecture, is that everybody's buildings, be they in Bombay, Birmingham, Bologna or Buenos Aires, look the same.
Consolingly, 'high technology' has also taught us that there is no need to concern ourselves with the weather or the functions for which the building will be used, or the variations in the cultural patterns of our clients—'high technology' applique- work can cope with all this old-fashioned 'nonsense'.
I think the time has come to ask ourselves a lot of questions. Could we have done something different? Should we have done something different? What does 'modern' mean? Can't we be 'modern' with other materials besides reinforced concrete, glass and aluminium trimmings? Can't we go back to the year 1BC (Before Concrete) and carry on with that wonderful history of research and development by applying twentieth keep termites out of it and another two or three thousand to learn how to build multi- storyed mud buildings. But we did do it, and our enemies on the other side of the hill also did it, though in their own way which was different from ours. Now 'developed communications' has taken the 'wonder material' to all the corners of the earth and we have succumbed to it like children falling upon a dish of instant hot cakes. So we all have identical pot-bellies and have forgotten 'mother's cooking'. Fortunately, the rebellion against 'instant mixes' has already begun and there is a yearning for 'fresh-compost-fed-vegetables and whole meal-bread'—so may be there is hope that we too as architects, can as our road signs say, 'Stop! Look! Proceed!'
Brick Jalis, Arches - Speciality of L.Baker
century knowledge and know-how while still showing love and respect for all that has gone before us?
Perhaps speed has been one of the major contributing factors leading to that catastrophic break with tradition. It probably took a thousand years for us to find out by trial-and-error how to make a mud wall impervious to rain and wind, another thousand years to learn how to
In view of the fact that there are over twenty million families in India without any sort of shelter, that we have to import cement from Korea to make up for the shortfalls, that we are using up a lot of our energy resources at an alarming rate, and that we have bred some of the top brains in the world of science, we should, for instance, in areas where mud has been the traditional staple building material, show how modern we can be with mud! Where burnt brick has been the main building material can't we produce brickswith less energy and use them in a modern way? There are experiments which show that this sort of thing can be done along with the new sender materials to produce buildings that are 'modern', beautiful, characterful and identifiable with a particular region and its people. For example, in the State of Kerala there is high rainfall, strong winds, powerful tropical sun and a lot of humidity. The result of ancient research and development work was a steeply-pitched roof which threw off torrential continuous rains and protected walls and rooms from the glare and heat of the sun. It all made good sense and good architecture. But concrete and glass towers are incredibly expensive because of all the antics required to cope with rain and sun, and they are quite useless without the air-conditioners, fans and louvers of aluminium strips. Can 'modern' architecture only be vertical of wall and flat of roof? Couldn't we throw off rain and protect from sun and show that we are doing it effectively, even by being modern'?
Since the beginning of recorded art, India's brains had devised the Jali (trellis, lattice, honey-combed walling, pierced stone and wooden screens and walls) to filter the glare and strong sunlight into cool but breeze-filled rooms. India has used this device more than any other country and it is essentially an Indian device. We can study the many and varied components of Indian architectural design and find out what makes them essentially and intriguingly 'Indian'. Only then can we create an Indian-ness into all our materials and designing. Then our 'modern' 'Indian' architecture will be a continuing, growing, crowing glory to our great heritage.
Extacted from the book: Laurie Baker Life, work, writings: By Gautam Bhatiya Viking / Hudco. New Delhi 1991
That is why plants are called The Brahma's hair:
15% of the heat in a building can come through the roof. That is why it is important to insulate the roof. In industrialised coun tries roof-top gardens are becoming a norm, Green-roof tops cut down a building's energy conumption. They add to the aesthetic value.
