LAURIE BAKER

I HAVE MY OWN PRINCIPLES WHICH I AM UNWILLING TO ABANDON. I DISLIKE FALSEHOOD & DECEIT. A BUILDING SHOULD BE TRUTHFUL.

Laurence Wilfred Baker

Laurence Wilfred "Laurie" Baker (2 March 1917 1 April 2007) was a British-born Indian architect. Graduated from Birmingham School of Architecture, 1937. Cost-effective energy-efficient architecture. Unique space utilisation & simple but aesthetic sensibility. Simple designs with local materials. Approach to sustainable & organic architecture. "Gandhi of architecture".

ARCHITECTURAL CHARACTERISTICS
Low cost, high quality. Bare brick masonry construction. Brick jali walls inviting a natural air flow to cool interiors, & creating intricate patterns of light &shadow. Irregular, pyramid-like structures on roofs, with one side left open & tilting into wind. Traditional Indian sloping roofs & terracotta Mangalore tile shingling with gables & vents allowing rising hot air to escape. Curved walls as a means to enclose more volume at lower material cost than straight & to provide ready-made shelves. Use of local materials eliminates transport costs. Use of low energy consuming mud walls, using holes in the wall to get light. Using overlaid brick over doorways, incorporating places to sit into the structure, simpler windows.

RAT TRAP BOND

An alternative to normal English bond masonry walls by which 15% of cost can be reduced without compromising the quality, strength and appearances.

FILLER SLABS
Employ replacing unproductive concrete by a 'Filler' material which reduces weight & cost of slab by reducing amount of concrete used. Also, since weight of slab is thus reduced, lesser steel is required for reinforcement, further reducing cost.

ARCHES
Provide a structure which eliminates tensile stresses in spanning an open space. All forces are resolved into compressive stresses. Several of available building materials such as stone, cast iron & concrete can strongly resist compression but are very weak when tension, shear or torsional stress is applied to them.

DOMES
An arch which has been rotated around its central vertical axis. Have a great deal of structural strength when properly built & can span large open spaces without interior supports.

Brick jali
Perforated brick screen for light & ventilation & for interplay of light & shadows. Contribute in cost reduction by lowering number of bricks used.

LAURIE BAKER CENTRE FOR HABITAT STUDIES

Located in the Nooliyode Village in Vilappilsala Panchayat, 12 kms away from the centre of Thiruvananthapuram city. Campus Area: 3.34 acre (1.35 hectares) An undulating piece of land dense with trees and other flora and fauna. Five buildings that represent the last set of buildings personally designed & built by Laurie Baker: o an office o a kitchen with a dining hall o a dormitory to house 16 persons with a lecture hall o a guest house to house seven persons o a tower that houses a rain water harvesting tank & a view tower where discussion sessions can be held. Built on stone quarry. No foundations used.

LAURIE BAKER CENTRE FOR HABITAT STUDIES

LBC OFFICE

LAURIE BAKER CENTRE FOR HABITAT STUDIES

LBC Dormitory

LBC Cafeteria

BRICK JALI WALLS

BRICK JALI WALLS

RAIN WATER HARVESTING SYSTEM

RAIN WATER HARVESTING SYSTEM

OTHER DETAILS

Other details

Other details

Other details

The Indian Coffee House, Trivandrum

The Indian Coffee House, Trivandrum

The Indian Coffee House, Trivandrum

The Indian Coffee House, Trivandrum

Conceived as a continuous gentle spiral ramp, with a central circular service core & with dining spaces provided on the outer side. Energy-efficient. Only jalis for ventilation & to let in light. Well proportioned, a cylindrical brick-red spiral continuing for a couple of floors & then terminating in a smaller cylindrical volume on top, giving a very unsymmetrical balance to whole structure. Central circular service consisting of 2 concentric circles. Inner smaller circular core is a narrow vertical shaft, for ventilation to central areas, open on the top, with openings at different levels. Walls made of exposed brickwork painted over white on inner side & brick-red on exterior. Built-in furniture: Table consists of a concrete slab fixed to wall & with a semicircular taper on one side, resting on a small brick arch which serves as legs.

CONCLUSION
Absolutely no use of plasters, paints and other embellishments. Brick jali- integral to Bakers vocabulary. Use of wooden jail. Overlapping brick joinery details. Cool interiors. Bare structural members. Simple spaces in organic forms. Negative spaces turned intelligently into useful ones by incorporating storage or seating. Low cost construction without compromising with architectural essence to spaces. Energy efficient.

THANK YOU!!!