Studiocommune

COMMUNE RESEARCH FELLOW 2022, Sanjana Bhatnagar is entering her final year at Pitzer college in Claremont, California where she is double majoring in Philosophy and Environmental Analysis. She has been exploring the nature of entanglement of self and the space at Kallayi, Calicut. She is interested in understanding and designing built environment which are fully integrated within their ecosystems, holding space not just for humans, but all who make up an ecosystem (such as plants, non human animals, and soil). Next year she will complete her thesis which delineates a phenomenological framework for biomimetic architectural practices.  

  Jayan's Abode began as an exploration of incremental nature of building a house, through the nature of growth of a family into a community. The act of building here is like the act of growing a grove: a meticulous controlled planting yet leaving room for the tree to communicate and grow in its own direction, thus forming a grove - a community of trees offering solace to organisms of all kinds. This Indo-Portuguese family envisages to build one such grove for their four member family to host their guests who travel annually to this abode for ayurvedic rejuvenation and yoga camp. The seed design is a residential unit that can house the four member family. The house invites guests every evening for shared dinner, thus offering an active kitchen yard and a sacred grove adjacent to the bedroom block. The private bedroom block and the public kitchen are connected by living space for select guests to engage with the family. In the later phases, the residence is integrated with the other...

  We have been constantly affected by the rising cases of human-canine conflicts in Kerala. Our friends who work with canines find that inter-species miscommunication and misunderstanding is at the core of this conflict. Unscientific disposal of food waste on streets being another reason for these rising conflicts. This is a proposal we prepared alongside NGO Hands for Paws and with inputs from Volunteers of PFA to develop a model infrastructure at the neighbourhood level in Trivandrum City. Designed in the model of a recreational space, the infrastructure adopts a cooperative structure of public private partnership. The local government could initiate this infrastructure by identifying unused, unoccupied private or public land in the city's neighbourhoods. The land could be taken on lease or on rent and the infrastructure could be operated and run by the resident associations themselves. Services of Kudumbasree could be used to collect food waste from the neighbourhood, feeding st...

WHO IS THE CITY ? 10 th March 2018, 4pm Written by: Taniya Grace Joshua (Taniya is an architect and an Urban Designer)   Among the many treasures of the city of Trivandrum, the treasure of books along the Palayam stretch forms one among the most valued. Lending a helping hand to the keen and needy students of the city, this stretch is occupied by the State Central Library and most importantly the Old Book Stores Lane. Studio Commune decided to walk through and read this Book Lane on 10 th March, as part of its exploration on Who Is The City? The Walk revealed a set of layers in the trade, unseen to the common public and yet to be discovered by those seeking. The initial days of this trade were quite informal and happened at Putharikandom. The history of these shopkeepers, all of whom hail from the same village Nemom, show that they have been engaged in this trade since childhood. Their grandfathers were engaged in collecting paper waste and had b...

Public toilets are quintessential for any urban space, devoid of which human excreta may adorn the public walls and streets. However, cities in India rarely address the needs of the urban commuters for a space to attend nature’s call. If urination can be characteristic of animals to mark their boundaries and to invite potential mates, human urine definitely do not enjoy any of these values. A breeding ground for flies and mosquitoes, city walls in our cities are transformed into instant urinals. Not only have they created zones of stink and discomfort, they also draw distinct boundaries that are exclusively a male domain.  A quick research on the use of toilets reveal that human civilization is not new to this technology. The traces of organized sewerage networks were clearly evident during the Indus and Roman civilizations, however, progression took the wrong turn and it was encountered by a regressive nature of relieving oneself that do not even meet the animal standards of ...