Dekkaido Mart Budanilkantha, Kathmandu Baha Spatial Agency 30/05/2021
SITE & CONTEXT
Dekkaido mart building lies near the junction of the road in the physical master plan book of Dekkaido farm house. This building will create a space to gather the road passenger, hikers and local community to buy the daily organic produce. Mart and its landscape serves as a public space for users. The space shall be a tiny and cozy to minimize the resources and at the same time to maximize the public engagement. The site is located at budanilkantha, Kathmandu which has a cold climate due to the presence of micro climatic factors. The trees of community forest, budanilkantha school and a free flowing clean river are the neighbors of Mart house. Currently a 24'x13' temporary structure made of CGI sheets and metal rests as a canteen in the site of Mart building. The plan is to use the resources of temporary structure for the construction of Mart.
CONCEPT & IDEA
The conceptual idea as per the architect combines the built and unbuilt space to harmonize the public engagement. The idea is to attract more road traffic into the building for the sake of buying, eating, takeout and waiting. Mart is the primary built structure to pull users and customers into this Farm house project. The building has to connect with the people who passes daily and weekly through the road. The perimeter verandah acts as a unprogrammed space for siting, eating and talking. A cycle parking for adventurist is provided within the enclosure to welcome the users. The whole idea of the design is based on tiny house concept of nepali village house. The minimalistic ceiling height, the attic for store and flexible staircase are the inspiration for this design. The fencing wall are integrated in such a way that it dedicates much of its space to the road traffic
DRAFT DESIGN
The multiple designs were iterated in software to follow the conceptual idea with a proper fusion of anthropometry, lights, mass and void. The illustration above shows two draft with different perimeter window and sectional height. To reduce the building mass, the wall is finalized with a clear height of 7 feet only. The complexity of gable ends and perimeter window is substituted by a clear lightweight single fiber sheet. The slope of 30 degree is maintained in the two way slope roof to increase the functionality of attic store. The exterior walls are sloped from 14" at base to 9" at top to mimic the geometry of main building which is already constructed.
The concrete framework were developed in draft design to highlight the opening. This complication were reduced to ensure minimalism in doors and window. The building's verandah were cantilevered to create a floating effect. This is also reduced to a solid mass whose area has been maximized to grow the functionality of this unprogrammed space. The complication of the metal truss is also reduced to minimum in final design. The mass and voids are balanced in such a way that it eases the construction process to be economical, fast and sustainable.
EXTERIOR VOLUMES
The rectangular 194 square feet mart space has two washroom amenities. The interior space of washroom are kept very minimum. The corner walls are modular which allows the construction team to accelerate the making process. The internal wall to divide washroom and mart is 6 inches. More existing vertical MS Pipes are used as a reinforcement to bind the walls. The floor plan is open and kept free to accommodate multiple function. The attic space is 117 square feet.
18 people can sit and eat at a once in this theatre style under the roof.
12 people can sit and eat at a once in this two seater style under the roof.
INTERIOR VOLUMES
The interior space has a open shelves to display the products for customers. These shelves are all smart and are in module. The mobile staircase connect the floor space into the attic. The attic will house a store units. In future this can be extended as a small office or a pantry for the staff who runs and looks at this mart shop. The opening are all transparent so the clear vision allows the transparency for road traffic to pause and enter the mart shop. The furniture's to be used here will be made from the old ply formwork reducing the wastage that was created during the construction process of main building. The gable end will have adjustable ventilation to allow hot air to escape from the interior volumes.
STRUCTURE
The Mart building will be made after the successful dismantling of the existing canteen. All the existing metal structure work of canteen building will be advantage to the construction team. The structures system used here is the Mild Steel square pipes. 2", 1.5", 1" mild steel pipes of heavier thickness shall be used to weave old existing structure. Since the monsoon is very near the construction process is in a reverse process. At first the crew will create a roof structures so that they can perform the earth work, wall work, floor work under the top cover in monsoon. The 0.40 mm galvanized sheet of 12 feet length will be used in roof. The 3 feet cantilevered metal purlin are a challenge here. The earth wall acts as a infill and insulation material only. The wall has no work to transfer vertical dead load and live load. The rcc band at top of the wall will reinforced the building much more and horizontal MS pipes acts as a diaphragm to the structure.
The illustration show the existing metal structures of canteen building. Out of 6 set of vertical structure, only 2 new structures of 10 gauge MS 2" square pipe has to be added to complete the framework of mart building.
TECHNOLOGY
The technology called Murali Rama system will be used in the wall construction. In this system the vertical poles are weaved with horizontal strips of bamboo. Our site has lot of bamboo scaffolding. In order to use this, untreated bamboo will be split into four halves. The split bamboo will be screwed into the composite metal and bamboo poles. Then there forms a cavity of around 10 inch in average where local earth soil will be poured and it will be rammed to make a rigid wall. More about this techniques can be accessed here https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=A41s6ebk m2k&t=26s Image credit: video archives of thevedicway.org, bhaktamarcos, uguerrero
One of the challenge of this techniques is the gap between the horizontal bamboo. To counter this effect the stones can be inserted while pouring the local soil. The rough surface in horizontal bamboo is necessary here to allow the mud plaster to stick proper. The soil to be used here in the cavity will be extracted from the stone foundation. The ancient Vedic plaster will be used in exterior wall. Its composition will be 4 clay, 2 sandy soil, 1 cowdung, 1 rice husk and water. The Nito mud plaster will be used in interior wall. Its composition will be 1.25 water, 2 clay, 2 sand, 0.5 straw. We have a lot of waste thatch that was generated from the thatch roofing at main building. This will be used as a substitute of rice husk and straw in both of the mud plaster work. The built structure will be a fusion of modern and natural practices of construction to allow more research and finding to develop for future generation.
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