LAURENCE WILFRED BAKER

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VIBHASH AJMERA

PERSONAL INFORMATION

NAME : LAURANCE WILFRED BAKER

Nationality : British-origin, Indian

Birth date : MARCH 2, 1917

Birth place : Birmingham, England

Date of death : April 1, 2007, aged 90

Place of death : Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India

Laurence Wilfred "Laurie" Baker was an award-winning English architect, renowned for his initiatives in low-cost housing. He CAME to India in 1945 in part as a missionary and since then lived and worked in India for over 50 years. He obtained Indian citizenship in 1989 and resided in Thiruvananthapuram (Trivandrum), Kerala. In 1990, the Government of India awarded him with THE PADMA SHRI, the nation's fourth highest civilian award, in recognition of his meritorious service in the field of architecture.

Baker's innovative use of discarded bottless, creates a

stained glass effect.

Education and missionary workBaker studied architecture in Birmingham and graduated in 1937, aged 20. His initial commitment to India had him working as an architect for an international and interdenominational Mission dedicated to the care of those suffering from leprosy. Finding his English construction education to be inadequate for the types of issues and materials he was faced with: termites and the yearly monsoon, as well as laterite, cow dung, and mud walls, respectively, Baker had no choice but to observe and learn from the methods and practices of the vernacular architecture. Inspired by his discoveries he began to turn his style of architecture towards one that respected the actual culture and needs of those who would actually use his buildings, rather than just playing to the more "Modern-istic" tunes of his paying clients.

Architectural style

Throughout his practice, Baker became well known for designing and building low cost, high quality homes, with a great portion of his work suited to or built for lower-middle to lower class clients. His buildings tend to emphasize prolific - at times virtuosic - masonry construction, instilling privacy and evoking history with brick jali walls, a perforated brick screen which utilises natural air movement to cool the home's interior and create intricate patterns of light and shadow.

  JALI WALL at Central for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram.

Another significant Baker feature is irregular, pyramid-like

structures on roofs, with one side left open and tilting into the wind.

Curved walls enter Baker's architectural vocabulary as a

means to enclose more volume at lower material cost than straight

walls. Baker's architectural method is one of improvisation, in which initial drawings have only

an idealistic link to the final construction, with most of the accommodations and design

choices being made on-site by the architect himself.

The living room of Dr. Dolas' residence, Baker playfully uses curved forms.

'The Hamlet', Laurie Baker's home,built on a steeply sloping and rocky hillside.

In one of the exhibition rooms, there is a chart written in his own hand listing the many things of wisdomhe discovered through his extremely productive working life as an architect and a humanist:• Only accept a reasonable brief• Discourage extravagance and snobbery• Always study your site and see potential relating to the soil, drainage, power, fuel etc.• You yourself get accurate site details and in-situ facts• Every building should be unique; no two families are alike, so why should their habitation be alike?• Study and know local materials, cost, building techniques and construction• Study the energy used in the production of materials and transport• Don’t rob national resources; don’t use them extravagantly or unnecessarily• Be honest in design, materials, construction, costs and your own mistakes

•Avoid opulance and showing-off by using currently fashionable gimmicks• Get your conscience out of deep-freeze, and use it• Look closely at your prejudices and question them• Have faith in your convictions and have the courage to stick to them

The living room at 'The Hamlet'. An integration of new building and salvaged timber from

traditional buildings that were being demolished.

The India coffee house in Thiruvananthapuram.

Awards

•In 1987 ,the first Indian National Habitat Award. •In 1989, Indian Institute of Architects Medal for Outstanding Architect of the year. •In 1990, Grand Masters Award - Architect of the year. •In 1991, Indian Institute of Architects Medal - Outstanding Architect. •In 1992, UNO Habitat Award and Roll of Honour. •In 1993, International Union of Architects - World Habitat Award. •In 1995, University of Central England. Doctor of the University.

Stainwell in Nalini Nayak's residence in Thiruvananthapuram,

Perforated brick walls create dappled patterns of light.

Centre for Development Studies Ulloor, Trivandrum, 1971 the most important project of baker’s career. The significance

of this assign ment had less to do with size and budget, than with the idea of exhibiting a range of concepts applied to buildings of varying functions, scale and dimensions.

An area of nine acres accommodates administrative offices, a com puter centre, an amphi-theatre, a library, classrooms, housing and other components of an institutional design.

WORKS

The Computer centre, Centre for Development Studies, Here Baker

evolved an innovative system of curved double walls to save on cost and to

conserve the energy that goes into air-conditioning a building of this scale and

purpose.

Here, at the summit, the library dominates the centre with a seven-storey tower; the administrative offices and classrooms are scat tered in a randomness determined by each one's position on the slope. However, the buildings remain tightly connected through corridors that snake upwards to the library along breezy walkways and landscaped courts.

Building textures, configurations and spanning elements demonstrate Baker’s easy manipulation of brick, all of which were made close to the site and fired with locally-available coconut palm wood. All surfaces, whether inside or out, in the dormitory or classroom, are exposed to patterns showing varying honding techniques and jali work. Openings are arched, corbelled or spanned with brick lintels. Wall thicknesses change on different floors, depending on the loading and requirement.

Loyola Chapel and AuditoriumSreekarayam, 1971

The Loyola complex contains a high school and a post-graduate complex, both sharing a common chapel and an auditorium. It was here that Baker's skills of cost-reduction met their greatest challenge, as it required a seating capacity of one thousand. In order to increase the lateral strength of the high brick wall, without the introduction of any steel or concrete, Baker devised a wide cavity double-wall with cross-bracing brick.

Both the walls were pierced with a continuous floor-to-roof pattern of jails, so that the chapel was adequately, though somewhat mysteriously, lit-and ventilated. Despite its tall proportions, the acoustics of the hall were remarkable-the exposed surfaces and the open patterns of brickwork controlling the reverberations.

Windowless cavity wall

The total covered area of the chapel and auditorium and the gallery is approximately 930 square meters. The cost in 1970-71, including the furniture and appurtenances, lighting and sanitation was kept within the original gift sum of 1.75 lakh rupees.

1. Chapel nave 2. Sanctuary3. Narthex4. Sacristy5. Chapel6. Terrace7. Auditorium8. Stage9. Green room10. Toilet

Plan of Loyola Chapel

Loyola Chapel and Auditorium: Estimate of Cost

Rate Quantity Figure Say

Excavation and refilling cu.ft. 0.06 16,000 960 1,000 Concrete foundations 1:4:8 cu.ft. 1.20 1,900 2,280 2,500 DPC:CM 1:3 crude oil 5% wt c. sq.ft. 0.30 560 168 200 RR masonry in 1:5 cm cu.ft. 0.95 3,360 3,192 3,300 first class bricks in 1:5 cm cu.ft. 1.80 16,100 28,980 29,000 4.5" brick in 1:4 cm sq.ft. 0.75 1,250 938 1,000 ditto query extra sq.ft. 0.75 1,600 1,200 1,500 flooring 4"1:4:8 plus c.finish sq.ft. 0.65 6,840 4,480 4,500 slab floor c. finish 500 0.5" cm plaster sq.ft. 0.22 11,860 2,609 3,000 3 coat whitewashing sq.ft. 0.03 11,860 355 500

I Supercem 3 coats (2 and primer) sq.ft. 0.30 11,860 3,560 4,000 RCframe cu.ft. 11.00 8,500 8,500 RCslabs cu.ft. 8.00 2,560 20,480 20,500 Doors 5,000 Windows 500 Chapel ceiling 10,000

Auditorium ceiling '" 7,500

Roof weathering 3" jelly tiles etc. sq.ft. 1.50 1,150 1,725 2,000 AC roofing sq.ft. 1.50 6,050 9,075 9,000 Steel trusses cu.wt. 115. 25,000 Sanitation and drains 2,500 Electrical installation 10,000 3% contingencies 4,425 4,500

Furniture for chapel 18,000

Total Rs 1,70,000

House for Dr A. Vaidyanathan Kumarapuram, Trivandrum, 1972It is the one of the Baker's more successful circular houses. In the Vaidyanathan house, the rooms are arranged in a wide arc facing the sea. The plan orients outwards in a double semicircle which incorporates all the major spaces of the house on the upper floor: living, dining and bedroom, with the semicircle ending in a study at one end and a car port in the other. A staircase at the entrance travels down to the lower floor that is built against the retaining wall of the hill and houses two additional bedrooms and a study. However, the brick walls of these rooms are separated from the inner stone retaining wall by a small air space, setting up an effective termite and moisture barrier.

A significant architectural feature of the Vaidyanathan House is an open-to-sky circular court, completing the inner wall of the house in a pattern of staggered brick and becoming the home of an ancient mango tree. Surprisingly, the entrance door is located on the side at the meeting point of the house and court wall-and not on an axial approach as may be expected.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

•LAURIE BAKER Life, Work & Writings By G.Bhatia

WEBLIOGRAPHY

• Www.Wikipedia.Com

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