Pooja Dalal Bachelor of Architecture 2009| Mumbai University Master of Architecture 2013 | University of Michigan Work Samples
Table of Contents
Institutional
Housing
Urban Research
- “Constructing the Other Space”, Federal University of Manaus, Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil M.Arch Thesis, University of Michigan - “The Porous Edge” , Mumbai, India B.Arch Thesis, Mumbai University - “Mira Road Hospital” , Mumbai, India 4th Year Studio, Mumbai University
- “Bagomoyo House”, Dar-es-salam, Tanzania as Project Architect - Spasm Design Architects
- “Yongsan WAY”, Seoul, S.Korea Vertical Cities Asia Competition Entry (Phase 1 Winner) - “Village Playground”, Songarh Village 1st month of studying Architecture
Please note: This is only a work sample, my entire portfolio can be available upon request
What you see is a reflection of you.
“"From now on, I'll describe the cities to you," the Khan had said, "in your journeys you will see if they exist." But the cities visited by Marco Polo were always different from those thought of by the emperor. "And yet I have constructed in my mind a model city from which all possible cities can be deduced," Kublai said. "It contains everything corresponding to the norm. Since the cities that exist diverge in varying degree from the norm, I need only foresee the exceptions to the norm and calculate the most probable combinations." "I have also thought of a model city from which I deduce all the others," Marco answered. "It is a city made only of exceptions, incongruities, contradictions. If such a city is the most improbable, by reducing the number of abnormal elements, we inmate the probability that the city really exists. So I have only to subtract exceptions from my model, and in whatever direction I proceed, I will arrive at one of the cities which, always as an exception, exist. But I cannot force my operation beyond a certain limit: I would achieve cities too probable to be real."� Invisible Cities, Italo Calvino
Intent
MANAUS CAMPUS
New rules of city building are devised as tools to develop the new research campus of the Federal University of Manaus. Familiar elements - the farm, the laboratory, the plantation, the shelter and the green house are used as basic prototypes to configure the campus. Seemingly simple, each of these rules protest the very space they exist in - the forest . While the forest is wild, free, dense and green, these five elements are domesticated, white, pure and very unfamiliar in that context. The thesis questions our imagination of a city.
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“Constructing the Other Space”, Federal University of Manaus, Brasil Graduate Thesis 2013, Taubman College, University of Michigan Awards: Buenos Aires Biennale for the South American Project, Thesis Honors Project, 2013, University of Michigan, Travel Grant: Brasil, 2012 The Federal University of Manaus is a formative exception of the city of Manaus. The campus lies hidden, in the center of the city, within a forest reservation of 600,000 sqft. The forest geographically disconnects the campus from the city, in the same way Manaus is disconnected from its surroundings by the Amazon rainforest.
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The thesis examines this condition of ‘a city within a city’ and leveraged this campus enclave of the Federal University of Manaus to re-imagine its exterior. The thesis will push the rules and regulations which construct a city to its limit, such that the campus starts to become something ‘other’ - like a space in a heterotopic mirror, which will re-construct our imagination of the city. In this ‘other’ space, everything will be altered using the same familiar rules of built and open space, of public and private space, of glass and of concrete, of justice, of everything architectural and of everything sensory. This other space, uncannily familiar, but completely heterotopic re-imagines the very basis of the neoliberal city.
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Formative Typology Farm: is a rural space; it is in the most genuine sense an opposition to technology. It is also in opposition to the forest. It is constructed. It is domesticated. It is contradictory but coexistent with the laboratory. It is the fruition of the experiment. Laboratory: is the lived space for students and researchers studying agricultural, animal and fishery sciences. It is sterile and white. It is a place of solitude, in contrast to the forest and the farm. Greenhouse: is a space and place where plants, alien and indigenous can be nurtured and developed. It is a space of a controlled environment. It doesn’t belong to its surroundings. It is a space where the inside and outside relationship is absolute. It is also a dialogue between the interior space and the environment. Shelter: Animals and species are captured from the forest and kept here in this shelter. This jailshelter contrasts the wilderness of the forest having set rules and restrictions. Plantation: The plantation is an artificially constructed forest for mainly research purposes and the forestry department. These portions of the forest are kept or replanted to study the effects of the forest, deforestation and other forestry related functions. This artificial forest is in contrast with the Amazon forest surrounding it.
Rules and Aberrations: The rules are simple ways of dictating various permutations and combinations of how these five elements come together, and deal with their own natures and adjacencies. They conform to our notion of building cities and space, of our notions of public and private. When these programs come together a generic city is formed, and even then it is a but absurd due to the inherent natures of these five elements.
Proposition The campus expansion in the forest reservation will be explored as a self reference for the city of Manaus. “From the standpoint of the mirror I discover my absence from the place where I am since I see myself over there. Starting from this gaze that is, as it were, directed toward me, from the ground of this virtual space that is on the other side of the glass, I come back toward myself; I begin again to direct my eyes toward myself and to reconstitute myself there where I am.� - Michel Foucault. Of Other Spaces (1967). Both the enclaves, the city and the campus are interlinked and networked with each other and the rest of the world through the industrial pole of Manaus. As all the enclaves of the city form an intricate relationship with each other, each one of them become formative exceptions of the city. There is a certain fragility in the bursting economy of Manaus. An architectural proposition for the campus expansion has to be carefully crafted so as not to disrupt the interdependence but to help strengthen the exceptional enclaves of Manaus.
As the city is different from its enclaves, it also encompasses them. It forms them, such that they remain different. The city sometimes with its eagerness to grow loses sight, and starts encroaching upon them, and thus making them less effective as spaces of exception. The enclave is a loophole where laws are different and travelling inside and outside is a feat. Here something are allowed, in the city they are not. The expanding campus will camp on these allowances and irregularities, which will address the pros and cons of the fragile city of Manaus.
Plan Research campus of the Federal University of Manaus, in a forest reservation of 600,000 sq feet in Manaus City, Amazonas. The plan adopts the rules and aberrations as defined by the project and starts to observe them on a larger grid in the Amazonian rainforest. A varied unexpected moments, with the base functions, making the space enigmatically uncanny. These forced interactions between dissimilar programs leads to abnormal transformations and adaptations of simple rules. Slowly the whole campus becomes dynamically aberrant, a new imagination of a city we are already used to. The project is perceivable, and yet critical, sometimes accepting of the neoliberal world we exist in.
Aberrant Perceptions The renderings show the quality of life in this otherspace enclave. Animals, crops and people coexist in this seemingly contradictory space within the Amazonian forest. This kind of city is almost unimaginable in its context, but it can only work with the demand of the neoliberal city.
Existing Site Oddness: The church as the only representational public space: The church seems to represent this institutional community. It acts as the public front, while all the other institutions are closed off to the outside. Architectural: Boundaries and walls-solid 10 feet stone compound walls enclose every institution. The separation from the road and the neighborhood is very conscious. The other institutions are situated inward on a slope connected by a narrow winding road. The entire site would be seen as a large campus with public functions minus the compound walls. Each building has its own privacy due to landscape an trees which surround them. The built form – almost all built form is 1- 3 storeys high. All of it is inward looking. The walls are higher than the built form. Strangeness in so called ‘community living’: All the institutions describe themselves as community living. There is no visual sense of unity in this area. The church and the parish are a community but there is no community living.
“The Porous Edge”, Sacred Heart Church Complex, Mumbai Undergraduate Thesis 2009, Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture, Mumbai University Awards: Charles Correa Gold Medal 2009, UDRI, BG Bhatt Gold Medal, KRVIA Man-created institutions or communities such as schools, monasteries, orphanages, old-age homes, special institutions or jails in an urban setting are structured in a certain way. They ‘enclose’ their inhabitants so as to disconnect them from the outside: the alien space. The growth of these ‘inmates’ is only as much as the institution or the powerful governing body wills. The lack of “representative spaces” for these inmates make their ‘lived spaces’ dysfunctional. They indicate the activities and everydayness. These communities are often enclosed or ‘walled in’ and though situated within the urban setting are delineated from the outside. The site selected for the imagination of the thesis is a Church Complex in a Suburb of Mumbai. Most evident on site are the huge barrier walls which perform their only function - enclose and constrict the inhabitants that live within them. “The paradoxical existence of the wall as a boundary that both separates and connects makes it a compelling interface. As such, the wall has the potential to enhance the relationship between the subjects and objects that it customarily separates. The manipulation of the ordinary along the wall exposes its potential as a liminal condition and positions it as the site of re-composition. The re-composition of body and space is a means to heighten our awareness of self and other.”
Monastery and Training Institute for Nuns Private and enclosed, the boundary of whose consists of a dance and drama institute, which can generate income for the daily needs for the nuns
St Arnold’s School (Existing)
The Home for the Paraplegics Along with the mandatory requirements like shelter, services and boarding, a vocational training institute, a small local museum, an arts and crafts center etc. are also added to the design. The Wall separates and connects the private and public areas to the exterior street, making the space viable for the lively-hood of its residents.
The Amphitheatre and the Chapel The amphitheatre and the chapel act as in-between program and cater to both institutions - the Orphanage as well as the Home for the Paraplegics. Inhabitants from both communities come together here, forming an interactive platform.
Sacred Heart Church Complex The church complex consists of various institutions which have been re imagined and re-imagined, the whole complex is now porous, has hierarchy of private, semi-public and public spaces , where individuals have their representational spaces, are not isolated and enclosed. The Boundary Wall The wall between the institutions and the exterior connects the inhabitants to the outside. Housed with public functions such as a library, chapel, museums, play areas, newspaper stands, tea stalls, and other such programs enable previously imprisoned inhabitants to connect to the outside world.
Sacred Heart Church (Existing)
Pedestrian Street/ Public Pathway
The Orphanage Children enliven the whole area. The walls are porous and interactive, with the exterior space and other neighbouring institutes. As a part of the design strategy, a vocational training center is also provided within the walls of the orphanage.
Redefining the Boundary Wall “The paradoxical existence of the wall as a boundary that both separates and connects makes it a compelling interface. As such, the wall has the potential to enhance the relationship between the subjects and objects that it customarily separates. The manipulation of the ordinary along the wall exposes its potential as a liminal condition and positions it as the site of re-composition. The re-composition of body and space is a means to heighten our awareness of self and other.� The Wall is used to connect spaces rather than separate their functions. While the thickness of the wall itself houses certain common programs, meant to be used by inhabitants of all the institutions and the public, creating maximum surface for interactions, between the inside and the outside.
“Mira Road Hospital”, Mira-Bhayendar, Mumbai
Undergraduate Studio 4, Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture, Mumbai University Mira Road Hospital and Community Center was designed after careful deliberation and study of the surrounding area. A public hospital was much needed on this site, the nearest one being more than fifty km away. This highway saw many accidents and fatalities due to high volume of truck and tempo traffic. This was a major point of entry into the city of Mumbai. Besides this, this area was extremely industrial and prone to many industry related accidents. There were no ER’s of medical care facilities in the vicinity. A through urban analysis led to the formation of a hospital program on the selected site. The site had some spatial oddness’s which had to be dealt with within the design of the hospital. There was a cemetery flanking the site on the east side and slums on the three other sides. Amidst these complex programs, boundary conditions had to be negotiated with the program of the hospital.
The staircase is an on site cast RCC structure. There is a glass facade facing the open green space and a skylight to provide enough light for the stair.
The plan excerpt shows the detail of the hospital ground floor. Flanked by the courtyard, carved into the hill on one side and the large open green valley on the other side, the Clinic sit nested in-between. There is always cross ventilation between these spaces. The hospital was complicated to plan out in the thin space available. There are 50 beds in the general ward and 20 beds in the maternity ward. The roof of the hospital is used as public open space for the surrounding community.
The cross section of the hospital shows the regularity of the structure which would make it less expensive to construct. It is designed as a shallow pad foundation, due to the availability of hard rock near the surface. The design innovation is in the simplicity of structure. The roof is used by the community. The facade is simple glass and aluminium framing. Each clinic has a small balcony. Timber screen protect service spaces adding as an element to the facade. Its not about the building, its about the surrounding.
“Bagomoyo House�, Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania Project Architect with Spasm Design Architects, Mumbai This house is located on the eastern beach of Dares-Salaam in a high end residential area of Bagomoyo. The design emphasizes a service bar to which all living functions are attached. The house is radically different from its two sides, and responds appropriately to its immediate surroundings - the Beach and the Garden. The beach side is differently glazed, always enhancing views to the ocean. The garden side being more reserved incorporating courtyards and internal gardens to include the greenery existing on site. The house has five bedrooms, a service quarter, two courtyards, a cantilever steel staircase, a swimming deck and an out house. The color, material and design caters to the tropical weather of Dar-es-Salaam. The roof, one of the key features of the house is a ten meter cantilever, spanned with a composite steel and RCC structure. The house is a ground plus one storey structure. This house required a lot of control and co-ordination between the contractor, construction manager and the structural engineers. The house uses a lot of local materials making it more cost efficient. The house also uses the local flora and fauna to make tropical spaces like courtyards and bamboo gardens within its design. Every window detail is customized, leading to the making of numerous construction drawings for windows, doors and other small details.
Facade The house set in a gorgeous location faces the ocean creating the want for a glass facade on the beach side. The windows are all sliding, opening up to a large balcony. The wood used in the frames is all local Tanzanian. Each shutter is made on site, with unique detailing. The frames are attached to the cantilevered roof and the stone floor. Lighting is incorporated within the design of the shutters.
Roof The 9 meter cantilevered roof is angled giving maximum opening towards the beach side of the house. There were a few manipulations necessary on site to account for trees. The cantilever was reduced from 13 meters to 9 meters as directed by the structural engineers. The roof structure was in steel fixed on to the RCC structure of the house making the whole house a composite. The roof also carried all the services and HVAC required making the ceiling a clean surface.
Stair The stair is partly cantilevered and partly RCC framed. The cantilever is supported on one side by an angled beam. The 6mm bent steel plate is clad with wood to create the tread. The railing is a bent metal tube, constructed on site.
Windows Every window in the house - kitchen, bathrooms, bedrooms and living are custom designed making the window schedule one of the most difficult and comprehensive aspects for the construction of the house. The pictured window is a wood frame box, with sliding long shutters.
ROOF GARDEN
UNIT TYPES/ FLEXIBILTY
SIZE OF GARDEN : 1250 M SQ CLUB, GYM AND SKY RESTAURANT : 1000 M SQ
BAR + PODIUM
RESIDENTIAL SIZE OF BLOCK : 80M X 80M, 6400 M SQ BUILDING FOOTPRINT : 1250 M SQ (50,000 M SQ) NUMBER OF FLOORS : 40 - 60 FAR : 12.3 (AV) NO OF UNITS : 600 UNITS
COMMUNITY BARS
PODIUM AMMENITIES: AMPHITHEATER SWMMING POOLS PARKS RUNNING TRACKS CAFES
SIZE : 1200 SQ M AMMENITIES : GYM, BAR MARKET, COMMERCIAL SPACE
1 BEDROOM UNIT AREA : 25-30 SQ M TARGET MARKETS -SINGLE ELDERS -STUDENTS -YOUNG PROFESSIONALS
FEATURES: OPTIONAL VESTIBULE SLIDING WINDOWS LEVER DOOR HANDLES PETS ENCOURAGED!
PARKING NUMBER : 650 UNITS AREA : 19200 M SQ
COMMERCIAL AREA: 14400 SQM OFFICE/RETAIL
TOWER + PODIUM
RESIDENTIAL AND COMMERCIAL TYPE
ROOF GARDEN SIZE OF GARDEN : 2000 M SQ BANQUET HALL : 1000 M SQ
RESIDENTIAL SIZE OF BLOCK : 80M X 160M BUILDING FOOTPRINT: 3000 M SQ NO OF FLOORS : 40 NO OF UNITS: 1000FAR: 11 (AV)
COMMUNITY
2 BEDROOM UNIT
SIZE : 4000 SQ M GYM, BAR, GAME ROOMS MARKET, DAY CARE
AREA : 50 SQ M TARGET MARKETS: -COUPLE ELDERS -YOUNG COUPLE +CHILD -YOUNG PROFESSIONALS
FEATURES:
PODIUM
OPTIONAL VESTIBULE SITTING ROOM SLIDING WINDOWS LEVER DOOR HANDLES PETS ENCOURAGED!
AMMENITIES: AMPHITHEATER SWMMING POOLS PARKS RUNNING TRACKS
PARKING NO OF PARKING : 800
Building Typology and Plot Sizes Tower - The tower comprises of mainly commercial use. It sits on square plot, consisting of one to two towers according to the allowable FAR.
COMMERCIAL AREA: 20500 SQM OFFICE/RETAIL ENTERTAINMENT
BAR + PODIUM
RESIDENTIAL AND INSTITUTIONAL TYPE
ROOF GARDEN SIZE OF GARDEN : 1000 M SQ BANQUET HALL : 1000 M SQ
RESIDENTIAL SIZE OF BLOCK : 80M X 80M BUILDING FOOTPRINT: 2500 M SQ NO OF FLOORS : 15 NO OF UNITS: 250 FAR: 9 (AV)
3 BEDROOM UNIT AREA : 90 SQ M TARGET MARKETS: -COUPLE + ELDERLY PARENTS -YOUNG COUPLE +CHILD+ELDERLY PARENT
FEATURES:
PARKING NO OF PARKING : 200
INTERNAL COURTYARD
RESIDENTIAL AND INSTITUTIONAL TYPE
COMMERCIAL AREA: 13500 SQM OFFICE/RETAIL ENTERTAINMENT NO OF FLOORS : 5
OPTIONAL VESTIBULE SITTING ROOM DINING AREA SLIDING WINDOWS LEVER DOOR HANDLES PETS ENCOURAGED!
Bar - The bar comprises of mainly residential use. The apartments lie either or on a single or doubly loaded corridor. The voids in the bar provide for community space within the larger building. These bars occur on either side of the central spine. Courtyard - These are low rung institutional/residential buildings enclosing within them a courtyard. They have public space in the central court.
“Yongsan WAY� Seoul, S. Korea Vertical Cities Asia 2012 Team: Sasha Topolyntska, Jonathan Moore Pooja Dalal, William Tardy, Nate Van Wylen Yongsan Way recognizes the housing crisis that is certain to affect the aging population of Seoul. Throughout Seoul and much Asia, housing developments maximize the profitability of each land parcel, often marginalizing the living conditions of residents, or targeting a price range beyond a fixed income. The contestant turnover or development and lack of urban durability also damages livability and natural environment. Yongsan Way addresses these problems at the building, block, and district scales. At the scale of the building, the project rejects the trend income or age-specific development and focuses on creating a diversity of housing types with each building that support people in different stages of life. The project deploys the bar and tower typologies with a collection of efficient units that support affordable living, multi- generational residents, urban intimacy, and site density. This encourages a diverse population and community to occupy each block.
Central Spine The central spine is mainly an infrastructural passage way, which has stacked functions such as road, railway, pedestrian pathway on the top of it. Either side of this infrastructural bundle are flanked residential/ commercial and institutional programs in accordance to the zone in which it falls. The central spines minimizes pedestrian traffic on ground level, connects major points on the plan and houses all important transport methods within it making it the backbone of this scheme.
Masterplan The Masterplan consists of three zones: the Knowledge campus, The Market Hub, and the Playground district. Each of these areas is designed according to its over arching program. The spine connects these areas, just like the human-spine connects every part of the body.
Section The density of built form is evident in the cross section of Yongsan WAY. Tall buildings flank the central spine, each get connected to the spine and form larger public space on the roof of the spine.
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Different fun methods are adopted to traverse the height across the spine. In some cases there are grand stair cases, in others there are escalators and elevators. There also exist some funiculars. 30m
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Masterplan On the south side of the plan lies the river where all the public functions terminate, into a larger recreational district with theatres, playgrounds, promenades and parks.
Looking at the Spine Pedestrian pathways provide for ample public space and facilities. Raised platforms, fun ways to traverse the spine makes this efficient scheme attractive
Epilogue: What I understood about Architecture and where we failed as Architects. This project was humbling. I realized the folly of architecture, and at the same time discovered its strength. So, as the story goes, some people we know returned to the village a year later. All our interventions were gone. They took it down probably two days after we left. At that time I was a little bit baffled, why would they take it down? It was the most humbling experience I have experienced. Retrospectively, we never did try to understand the needs of the villagers. We imposed western ideas on them, and that is where we failed. Understanding people, understanding clients, and understanding public, the way space can be used, is what I learnt from this very amazing experience. Architecture has immense power.
“Playground� Songarh Village, India B.Arch Study trip, Year 1, Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture, Mumbai University This was probably one of the most important projects I was a part of. It taught me a lot about Architecture. But it taught me most about people. We, a class of 40, in the first month of commencing our undergraduate studies, travelled to a remote village in India. We spent the first few days in the village, mapping it with our hands and feet, due to the unavailability of any instrument. We drew these houses out and the entire map of the village with minute details. It was one of the most difficult tasks I have ever performed, in the scorching heat of India. I enjoyed every moment of it. Next, we formed groups and were supposed to select sites to construct something for the villagers. At that time, we were zestful and excited, and started our task with naive confidence. Our group decided to construct a playground for the village school. None of the villagers knew what a swing or a slide was. They looked at us, when we explained the design, like we were mental! We had local materials, bamboo, rope and some wooden planks, nets and cane weaves to construct our playground. After tremendous amount of work, it came to fruition with immense help from the Villagers. Our next task was to make the kids play in these foreign things. They were sceptical, but once they saw us sliding and swinging, they were willing to try it out.