V I D A, an international group of architects and urban designers has won the competition for a 100-acre residential township for 40,000 residents in South India. The client has retained V I D A to design this whole township, till construction and subsequent opening scheduled for 2013.
More on this project after the break.
With India undergoing rapid urbanization, housing has emerged as one of the most important typologies that needs to be addressed, in order to fulfill demands that range from affordable housing to ultra-luxurious dwellings. A by-product of this kind of rapid growth is the emergence of entire cities and townships from scratch outside the major cities, with little historical or physical context. Hence, in order to make these developments successful, one needs to create a strong identity from within, which can start informing the surroundings in the future.
Learning from the history of ancient Indian cities, we decided to form 4 separate communities, that would each have their own identity, with a rich mix of ultra-high density architectures as well as low density dwellings, that further enrich the texture of the development. This ‘mixing’ of typologies and program is also appreciated from a real-estate standpoint, enabling the developer for form phases, and judge the success of particular typologies.
These communities are separated/integrated by landscape, which manifests itself sometimes, in the form of berms and pathways, and othertimes merges with the architecture of the public buildings. A stream with bike and pedestrian paths connects all these clusters with each other.
As this development is supposed to acquire the LEED Gold standard, special attention has been focuses on various landscape elements like the berms and water features that will help channel rainwater and prevent ground runoff.
Architectural and Urban Designers: V I D A Location: South India (exact location withheld on client’s request) Commission: 2011-2015 Design Directors: Drone Iyangar, Pranav Iyer Design Team: Sam Keville, Cris Oprea Rendering and Visualization: Bezier CG, Ben Tripp Site area: 100 acres (404,685 sqm) Project built-up area: 1,011,714 sqm (250 acres) Phase I expected completion: 2013 Design Images and Diagrams: Courtesy of VIDA
