VIKAS DILAWARI ARCHITECTS​
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MUMBAI, MAHARASHTRA
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The firm works out of small office, which houses a team of the Pricincipal Architect - Vikas Dilawari, and two senior architects and a group of interns (mostly four-six). The role of the junior architect is not confined to silos or parts of the poduction, but the task of handling all aspects of the project itself. It tested my confidence with speaking to clients and contractors, exposed me to the world of (ethical) conservation in Mumbai. I learnt a lot in terms of working as a team, since everyone was tasked with a certain responsibility.
Documentation and Monitoring
Site documentation and defects​ assessment, site monitoring
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The site is located within one of Mumbai’s most vibrant heritage precincts, teeming with old religious structures and places of institutional value. I was overawed by Bhuleshwar, for this was once the Bazaar of the city, and still is. Only, it is highly stratified, and crystallised, at the same time, making it less organic and more ad-hoc. The site itself, located on the junction of the main street and the street leading to the market houses a temple built over a century ago. This project required extensive documentation of structural defects and the reasons for the same. It was a discussion of the extreme recklessness of urbanisation in older/cessed precincts, as well. The primary cause for the irreparable structural defects that manifested in the form of large cracks all over the stone building was the construction of a building in the immediate periphery of it. It felt like we were dealing with the kind of nightmare that is a happy dream in the REM cycles of utterly insatiable builders and real-estate speculators. The proposal involved talking to a structural consultant and working on certain aesthetic defects.
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Apart from this, I was asked to do site monitoring of three ongoing restoration sites, looking for discrepancies in civil work.
Masterplan and Design
Site planning, cottage design
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The owner wanted to open a heritage property up into a resort with sport facilities and a few cottages. We made proposals for the same with cottage layouts. There was an old building, which was to be renovated into a dining area, for which we made a proposal. The owner had a palace, for which we created a mapping document to help further the restoration process.
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This one’s looking at the field of conservation from a myopic perspective. I spent three months in the office of one of the most prolific conservation architects of India, Mr. Vikas Dilawari. Excited as I was, I landed in the office dreaming about visiting and investigating glorious old buildings of Bombay (the only part of Mumbai I can bring myself to love). And I did. I was part of three sites and that got me close to the work that goes into bringing a new lease of life to heritage buildings. I could only imagine what it must have been like for Mr. Dilawari at a time when almost nobody in Mumbai recognised the title ‘Conservation Architect’ (they called him a ‘conversation architect’, he guffawed, a typo that I wouldn’t admit to no not making.) The landscape of conservationism seemed to be a perfect fit for me – science meets art meets history meets sustainability meets damn-the-capitalist.
That is how it was at Vikas Dilawari Architects.