r house in 1995, all the work we have done is ecological and 99% using earth.
TH: What are some of the inspirations that steered you in this direction?
CKV: Inspirations have been many and always depends on how one looks at it. The philosophies and methods of Laurie Baker, the Indian Institute of Science and its innovations in mud construction and all the different works at Auroville have been my teachers, but to be able to put it in action in the fast-growing city of Bangalore - will compel me to claim it has been just our persistence and firm belief that mud is possible in urban settings. Also, the contribution of our engineer friends who have helped us realize our visions is paramount.
TH: What is an interesting recent project that you've been working on?
CKV: Now the office has grown from a one-woman show to eight partner architects and people from other professional spheres - all working on many different projects. I work on few and one of the recent one is a small resort near Satpuda Game Reserve, in the state of Madhya Pradesh.
This project has been interesting personally because it was in a different context. Here we had to learn from contending with a restricted range of available material and still make the place unique. We were lucky to have a very enthusiastic contractor who is also a trained architect, Vikesh Agarwal. His team worked wholeheartedly and we worked extensively on "cob" walls for the rooms, and we also built partly with rammed earth.
There are many other projects happening in the office which are all very interesting in terms of their nature of client brief, construction method and materials and finally the design per se. We find every residence to be a fresh challenge.
We are currently doing a marketplace for rural women, an orphanage / reading centre, an eight room resort in Coonoor, on 150 acres of abandoned tea estate, a school for blind children and numerous residences.
Besides Architecture Biome (as the new office is known) is also involved in giving strategic consultancy towards issues of water, sanitation (we just built 10 bamboo based EcoSan toilets in flooded districts of Bihar), alternative energy and consulting for other architects in making their projects ecological. As Biome we also conduct workshops for school children, college students and do training in rainwater harvesting and building techniques.
TH: How would you characterize the green building movement in India, in terms of past and recent developments, and in comparison to North America or Europe?
CKV: The Green Building movement is taking big strides in India and most informed architects are looking at ways and means to make right choices.
Our vernacular and historic architecture has always been very sensitive to nature. We can see many examples of innovations of water harvesting, cooling, ventilation and use of local materials in them.
In the recent past works by the likes of B.V. Doshi, Charles Correa and Achyut Kanvinde too incorporated material, climate and culture in their projects and for all of us practising now there is much to learn from them.
Currently, there is an improved awareness with both architects and clients of the negative impact on the environment buildings can make and there is interest in both to work towards sustainability. Many times the decisions of being green makes business sense in terms of reduced cost of water, energy and maintenance aspects and in a lighter vein they are also taken in light of the attention these projects would receive in the media - and this is a lot to do with how Western press would see our works!
Indian architecture has a very strong language historically and has held its own, while the British incorporated elements and created a synthesis. As we embarked on building our nation after independence we were in a hurry. Though we have some good works by foreign as well as Indian architects, what happened was that as India built large educational institutes and many infrastructure projects, it also built many sorry buildings in concrete and bricks.
With the advent of the infor