Permeable Patterns
- Vol.36(12), December
- New Delhi Burda Media India Private Limited 2019
- 236-239p.
The mall is a design project for an entire micro-urbanism. The identities of the mall, both as a commercial space and a sustainable complex are understood to be symbols projected onto the administrative capital of the state of Chhattisgarh, representing Naya Raipur as India’s fourth prosperous and planned smart city. A mall, being a commercial building, requires a critical approach towards positioning, zoning and magnetic aspects. After a deep insight towards these critical factors, the planning and design was took forward with a sustainable and charismatic approach which pleases not just the client but also the visitor. It is aptly placed around the administrative buildings in the vicinity serving as a landmark and a turning point for the otherwise structured building envelopes.
“As the city of Raipur is still growing, affordability is still a criterion. Thus, the ideology behind this commercial complex was to apply basic design principles like mutual shading and building orientation, so as to conceive a sustainable mall with minimum energy consumption.”
Breaking away from the age-old philosophy and concept of a mall to be a conventional glass building with no play of forms, the project accommodates an abstract use of jaali work as an elevation feature with a dynamic built form where the building facade changes at every viewing angle. The concept is based on an emerging helical form which rises from the ground and gives the notion of originating from the surrounding landscape.