WHTL Booklet for PM

Modern Heritages with Significant Architectural Values in World Context

Sher-e-Bangla Nagar & Dhaka University

National Assembly Complex, Bangladesh.

Location: Year of construction:

Sher-0E-Bangla Nagar, Dhaka Commissioned in late 1962 Construction Began with presidential square in 1965 The work was largely completed in 1985

Building Type: Owner : Current User : Managed / Maintenance Authority: Current Use:

Institutional Building Government, Peoples Republic of Bangladesh.

Bangladesh Parliament Secretariat Ministry of Public Works,GOB National Assembly and Offices

National Parliament Building and Master plan (Existing) Sher-E- Bangla Nagar Comlex The building marked in red are the building Designed by L.I.Kahn

National Parliament Building and Master plan (Last Proposed ) Sher-E- Bangla Nagar Comlex Louis I. Kahn Collection, University of Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Philadelphia. 1963 Louis I kahn, Complete Works 1935-1974

Louis Kahn designed the entire Jatiya Sangsad complex, which includes lawns, lake and residences for the Members of the Parliament (MPs). The architect’s key design philosophy was to represent Bangladeshi culture and heritage, while at the same time optimizing the use of space. The exterior of the building is striking in its simplicity, with huge walls deeply recessed by porticoes and large openings of regular geometric shapes. The main building, which is at the center of the complex, is divided into three parts – the Main Plaza, South Plaza and Presidential Plaza. An artificial lake surrounds three sides of the main building of Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban, extending to the Members of Parliament hostel complex. This skillful use of water to portray the riverine beauty of Bangladesh adds to the aesthetic value of the site.

In the architect Louis Kahn's own words: In the assembly I have introduced a light-giving element to the interior of the plan. If you see a series of columns you can say that the choice of columns is a choice in light. The columns as solids frame the spaces of light.

Now think of it just in reverse and think that the columns are hollow and much bigger and that their walls can themselves give light, then the voids are rooms, and the column is the maker of light and can take on complex shapes and be the supporter of spaces and give light to spaces. I am working to develop the element to such an extent that it becomes a poetic entity which has its own beauty outside of its place in the composition. In this way it becomes analogous to the solid column I mentioned above as a giver of light.

It was not belief, not design, not pattern, but the essence from which an institution could emerge...

Dhaka University, Bangladesh.

Modern Heritages with Significant Architectural Values

Heritage Building and Sites Dhaka University Campus

Proposed Master plan of Shahbag and Dhaka University by Muzharul Islam

Fine Arts Institute

Location: Year of construction: Building Type: Owner : Current User :

Dhaka University Campus, Shahbagh 1953-1955 Educational Institute Dhaka University.

The Faculty of Fine Arts, Dhaka University.

Managed / Maintenance Authority:

University of Dhaka Authority

Current Use:

Academic Building under DU

Muzharul Islam was commissioned to design the public library between 1953 and 1954. Situated very close to the Race Course Maidan, the idea of a building in a garden is manifested in the design. The main building which houses the book stacks, is raised on pilotis that connect the gardens from the east to the west. Architect Muzharul Islam’s thus created an entry where the front flows into the garden and the garden flows into the front side of the building. The columns on the ground floor pavilion are narrow and placed together in groups of three, so as to merge with the trees of the garden. This soft motion of spaces and the transition of the building into the garden reflects architect’s sensitivity not only towards nature, but also towards the stimulation of the senses as one passes through the spaces of the building. The entry would serve as a common space which also connected to the Dhaka University campus and allowed people to gather on the pavilion. The library expresses a very clean and clear arrangement of form, but a deeper understanding of the socio-cultural context and philosophical standpoint is manifested through subtle abstraction of space making.

Dhaka University Library (Old Building) Location: Year of construction: Building Type: Owner : Current User : Managed / Maintenance Authority: Current Use:

Dhaka University Campus, Shahbagh 1953-1955 Educational Dhaka University.

DU Central Library , Dhaka University.

University of Dhaka Authority Library Building under DU

The Fine Arts Institute announces the beginning of a Tropical Modernism in the sub-continent that deliberately stood away from both stigmatized colonial and hybridized traditional forms. It achieved an immediate iconic status, as a work in a modernist vocabulary inflicted by place and climate. The project is characterized by low sprawling buildings in a natural garden sitting on an urban site. The pavilion like openness of the building pathways through varieties of enclosure and garden spaces and the natural and sensorial ambience, create a campus ideal for the contemplation and learning of the arts. A minimum number of trees were allowed to be cut down in the course of the building and landscaping. The front block, which stands on pilotis allows entry to the campus without any formal obstruction but articulate the threshold between larger open spaces and enclosed classrooms. The teaching block contains classroom of various sizes with provision of cross ventilation and north light. Curvilinear volume of the teaching block predefined an existing pond in a circular shape. This work will always remain as the epitome of Bengali modern architecture.

E- Library - Faculty of Business Studies Formerly known as National Institute of Public Administration (NIPA) Building

Location: Year of construction: Building Type: Owner : Current User : Managed / Maintenance Authority: Current Use:

Dhaka University Campus, Shahbagh 1963-1965 Educational Dhaka University.

E- Library - Faculty of Business Studies, DU University of Dhaka Authority Faculty of Business Studies, DU

The National Institute Of Public Administration (NIPA) Building as it was then called, later to become a part of the Faculty of Business Studies, DU is a part of the university campus. The three storied rectangular academic building with its large expanse of open ground to one side has a major presence amids plenty of trees and vegetation. The peripheral slender concrete columns rise without interruptions for two levels before they became a part of the third. This elegant columns with their exposed concrete texture, evenly spaced along the facades are excluded from the corners, and the rectangle is completed by the slabs of the third level and the roof. The projected thin concrete roof help shed the building and keeps out the rain from the open circulation corridor of the level below.

The building expression is honest with regard to its structure and material. The clarity of this expression and the elegance of proportion the expressions of the building style prevalent in the West at that time. The concern for the local climate finds expression in the overhangs and the recesses.

The relationship of structure to space and the transition between outdoor and indoor are the major features in his work. The architect had also designed the gardens with perennial and seasonal flowers but that unfortunately remained unrealized.

Teacher-Student Center by the Dhaka University authorities

Location: Year of construction: Building Type:

Dhaka University Campus, Shahbagh 1962-1965 Educational

Owner :

Dhaka University.

Current User :

Dhaka University

Managed / Maintenance Authority: Current Use:

Dhaka University Authority Teacher-Student Center , DU

Located at the historic heart of the University of Dhaka, TSC that arguably captured the imagination of the people and, given its central location, became an emblem of Dhaka's architectural modernity. Access to the site is from the north, where three streets meet to form a major urban node and is a historic gathering place of students and the public during national celebrations. The horizontal building block to the north acts as a transition from the urban hustle and bustle to the verdant interior of the complex.

The buildings are aligned with the east-west axis to take advantage of the prevailing breeze from the south or north. The three-story Student Union Building is trendsetting rectangular building as it employs a doubleroofed structure to minimise heat gain by allowing the cool breeze to pass through the two layers of the roof.

Providing a protective canopy for the building shell, the upper roof has a wing-like formation with rainwater drainage in between. The auditorium is covered by a reinforced concrete parabolic vault, a pioneering construction technique in the country. The airy cafeteria features a high ceiling, and overlooks the sprawling courtyard in the north. It consists of two segments placed on either side of a linear green mall. The western wing of the cafeteria contains a large games room, dressing rooms, showers, and toilets that serve the swimming pool. The eastern wing houses the main eating area and a kitchen with necessary auxiliary spaces.

Covered walkways, supported on steel columns, weave the major buildings and green spaces together.

Functioning more like a continuous loop of linear pavilions rather than corridors, the walkways are the social spine of the entire complex. TSC is one of the first buildings in Bangladesh to employ a pavilion theme in non-residential architecture. Extensive use of brick jalis (or latticework) in the buildings ensures visual privacy, while providing natural ventilation.

TSC exemplifies a modernist architectural sensitivity toward spatial needs for tropical climatic conditions. It blends local parameters of space-making—particularly the indoor-outdoor continuum and generation of space around courtyards—with international-style visual expression of building forms.

Over the years, TSC has become part of a national narrative in which many of the pivotal student movements took shape around this historic urban node.

Furthermore, TSC is also celebrated as a verdant and breezy urban space, a rare liberating experience in this overcrowded city.

Selected Bibliography

Image courtesy:

Drawing Courtesy:

Institute of Architects Bangladesh IAB Centre, Plot-11, Road-7, Block-E, Agargaon Sher-E-Banglanagar, Dhaka