Thread by @TheMuslimsofIN

Architecture is not just about buildings, it’s about society, culture, psychology, politics, landscape, the environment, economics, engineering, mathematics, art, craft, materiality, technology, impact, and projecting the future. It’s about people, place and time.

#Architecture tells a story:of #people who inhabit it,of its #place in context,of #times it's seen.This house is symbolic of use,history,culture,style.Was it always this color?Was it built at once or incrementally?Is it unified or divided inside?So much to peel, layer by layer...

#Vernacular architecture is the architecture born of a place, deeply rooted to the context, created using local materials and age-old technology passed down through generations. The courtyard houses of India are a vernacular archetype for residential architecture...

This was my grandfather's house, before it was razed down to make way for another commercial complex clad in aluminum paneling. Wooden rafters and clay tiles covered the kitchen roof, evidence of locally-sourced materials and fabrication...

I was named after my great grandmother, and during my undergrad thesis I began to seek a connection to her, exploring the lanes of Hussaini Alam in which her house used to exist, no doubt a courtyard (sahn) house with an outer verandah (daalaan), inner verandah (pesh daalaan)...

...drawing room(deewaan khana) with an outdoor stoop (chabutra), kitchen (bawarchi khana), pantry (modi khana), wash area (chowbaccha), balconies with wooden lattices (jaali)...

...a bridge over the road that connected two sides of the house(damdama or chhatta). Rare remnants of these elements can be seen in the narrowest hidden lanes of the Old City (excuse these grainy images, they're from ~2007)...

Layer upon layer
Sheet below sheet
Once upon a time
History repeats
Me upon you
Old below new

You are no more
Neither is your home
But I am here
Tracing you on my own
Searching for glimpses of you
Old below new

In the cracks of the plaster, new upon old
In the lanes and the gulleys, a tale untold
In the courtyard, sunken below layers of street
In between buildings, I hear your heart beat
In the dust-specked light filtered through
In remembrance of a memory I never knew

Layer below layer
Street upon street
Line below line
The code is complete
You below me
Tee upon tee

You are no more
But I bear your name
With glimpses of you in me
I am here all the same
In search of you
Old below new

My homonym
My humnaam
My namesake

~Takbir Fatima II

My thesis was a quest. To understand impact of impulses of changing cities on vernacular neighborhoods, how they grow and evolve, how spaces transform in their function and style, how the street character changes with time...
(1:100 study model of Hussaini Alam Rd in my studio)

This is the #Deccan Button Factory, that was one of the many factories set up during the Asaf Jahi dynasty. The factory used to manufacture customized buttons for the Nizam himself. The now defunct factory still has the vintage button-making machinery...

deccanchronicle.com/nation/current…

Motor vehicles have been on #Hyderabad roads since the 1800s. Here's an iron badge that served as a driver's license from the Nizam's time, manufactured by the Deccan Button Factory. It was worn on the arm while driving!

The Old City of Hyderabad had an advanced underground drainage and water supply system since 1800s. This is a fire hydrant in Hussaini Alam. The drainage system is so well-designed that the Old City never floods, but newer areas frequently go under water during heavy rains.

...Studying the elements of vernacular courtyard houses, we come to understand that these are valuable needs of a house that are being erased by the cookie-cutter air-conditioned...

...units of today, that rarely provide tailored solutions to their inhabitants, and lack character, privacy, adaptable gathering spaces, passive cooling, natural light, low-impact and low-energy buildings that sit lightly on the ground and shading from existing trees...

...According to current building byelaws, buildings are required to have setbacks all around so that there is distance created between neighboring buildings for ventilation and open space for rainwater percolation into the ground...

...But these are very technical solutions that overlook design aspects such as the need for privacy, programmatic planning of spaces and their relation to one another, the importance of unpaved open spaces. We can look towards vernacular examples for better solutions...

The sketch on the left shows a house designed with setbacks. This is an outward-looking house. On the right is an inward-looking courtyard house in which the green open space in the center is where all windows open and cool air and sunlight is brought into the heart of the house.

There is a lot to learn from prominent architect Charles Correa’s humble and understated houses designed with respect to the Indian context, where spaces are shared and behave differently during the day and night, with courtyards that cool and bring nature indoors.

...Notable Hyderabadi #architect and my mentor, Syed Anwar Aziz’s houses also value functionality, daylighting and green spaces. I’ve learned a lot from his design approach. A house designed by him is now up for rent on Airbnb!
abnb.me/ndie3C9qP1

Here are two residences we’ve designed, both of which have completely different scales and sizes. One is on a site of just 100sq yards (~84sqm)and the other is on a site of 300sq yards (~250sqm). What’s common between them is that they both have courtyards and are inward-looking.

...Design in architecture is all about working with your eyes, hands and mind, be it sketching, modeling at different scales, manipulating material, programming or just daydreaming. There is equal amounts of thinking and labor, and equal use of the left and right of the brain!

Traits useful in practicing or appreciating architecture:
+openmindedness
+interest in art, history, culture
+wanderlust
+observation
+lifelong learning
+physical stamina
+mental resilience
+reading
+writing
+working w/hands
+original and critical thought
+willingness to be wrong

Traits that will hinder the appreciation or practice of architecture:
+Single-Solution Syndrome
+narrowmindedness
+unwillingness to be wrong or explore
+fear of failure
+fear of experimentation
+bigotry or judgmental mindset
+inability to learn
+hopelessness
+lack of motivation

Single-Solution Syndrome is what I like to call the belief that there is only one single solution or answer to any given problem. That's not how design works, and that is certainly not how life works. I talk about Single-Solution Syndrome in my TEDx talk:

An architect is not necessarily (but can be):
+a talented artist
+good at model-making
+an elevation designer
+an interior designer
+a 3D visualizer
+one who adds ornamentation or aesthetics to a building
+one who cuts down trees to make skyscrapers
+a good speaker
+rich & famous

Architecture need not be:
+a luxury to be enjoyed by a limited few
+impractical
+gaudy or over-the-top
+an afterthought
+secondary to engineering
+a replica of historical buildings
+insensitive to local context
+destructive to the environment
+right or wrong
+built