Doshi Takes Gold
Doshi now has a RIBA Gold Medal and a Pritzker Prize (photo: Pratik Gajjar).
Balkrishna Doshi says he is “truly overwhelmed” by the news of his Royal Gold Medal. The Indian architect said that the recognition from the Royal Institute of British Architects was particularly meaningful as he had been working under Le Corbusier when he received his own medal from the Queen back in 1953.
“I vividly recollect his excitement to receive this honour from Her Majesty. He said to me metaphorically, ‘I wonder how big and heavy this medal will be,’” said Doshi. “Today, six decades later, I feel truly overwhelmed to be bestowed with the same award as my guru, Le Corbusier.” Disegno hopes that the RIBA hasn’t been stinting on the medal weight and width in the intervening decades.
Doshi, who already won a Pritzker in 2018, has a reputation as an architect who has dedicated his career to improving housing conditions for India’s poorest citizens. Many of his earliest projects included designing low-cost housing systems for India’s displaced population post-Partition and creating homes for workers on large-scale industrial development projects. His low-cost housing scheme in Aranya, Indore, provided accommodation for some 80,000 people in attractive brick houses built around courtyards.
“Six decades later, I feel truly overwhelmed to be bestowed with the same award as my guru, Le Corbusier.”
Although he worked under Le Corbusier, he hasn’t been blinkered by the same absolutist view to city planning. “Even if it is made of bricks, housing cannot be thought of as permanent,” said Doshi. “The most important thing is to think about the project over time. Housing is not inert. It is a living entity.” As an architect, his work often focuses on the less flashy – and fragrant – side of the discipline, ensuring that there are adequate connections to sewage and power lines and making sure the residents being relocated from slums will genuinely have the resources they need to build lives with room to expand.
It’s a humble approach that eschews micromanagement. Still working every day at his studio, Sangath, at the age of 94, Doshi thanked his wife and daughters first in his acceptance of his RIBA Gold. Doshi and his own family live by his philosophy of a house as a site of constant evolution. Their home, Kamala House, was designed by the architect back in 1959 and is named for his wife. Having raised their family there, it witnessed the marriages of three of their daughters and two of their granddaughters.
With a RIBA Gold and a Pritzker on his mantelshelf, Doshi’s place in the halls of international architectural fame is secured. With India still facing an acute urban housing crisis, hopefully, his lessons in building flexible homes with dignity will also be immortalised in policy.
Words India Block