Architectural Design VI

What makes a building complex (multiple user groups, functions, the public/service split, a civic role); typologies and their governing constraint; reading and augmenting a complex brief; objectives vs constraints; precedent study by diagram; and arriving at a parti.

Site analysis at urban scale; reading the context by figure-ground, edges and street hierarchy; approach, arrival and the public realm; civic presence and frontage; massing strategies (podium-tower, courtyard, spine, object); climate as a form-giver in India; and computing the buildable envelope early.

From brief to a defensible area program (Peña); sizing from Time-Saver/Neufert; public/private/service zoning and the served/servant idea; adjacency matrices and bubble diagrams; circulation design for crowds and wayfinding; and integrating universal accessibility from the program (RPwD 2016, Harmonised Guidelines 2021).

Structure as a design discipline (grid, long-span systems); the spatial demands of services (cores, shafts, plant, the ceiling plenum); HVAC in the section; and NBC 2016 Part 4 fire and life safety woven in — occupancy and occupant load, the 500 mm exit unit, two remote exits, travel distance, and refuge areas above 24 m. Integration, not coordination-after-the-fact.

From scheme to design-development depth; resolving plan, section and elevation as one coherent object; the comprehensive drawing set; physical and digital models; the design narrative; composing the boards; and preparing, defending and self-critiquing the design at the jury.