Architect plans a campus at Mahabs using traditional building practices

With the aim to bring back traditional building practices, Kaushik developed a design concept called Agaraadhi — From an epoch bygone to a habitat redefined for Mahabalipuram.

“There is excessive tourism-oriented development happening in Mahabalipuram and because of that, the land value has increased in the surrounding areas as well. If you notice, people living in the region don’t practice local building practices anymore because of lack of materials. Through this architectural design, I wanted to empower the native community and their indigenous practices and reassure them that what they’ve been doing for centuries is good enough. I hope my concept would encourage them to continue doing so while also co-existing with the modern world,” says Kaushik.

A graduate of Rajalakshmi School of Architecture, he developed an understanding of how local-level actions can have global level impacts. “In the past century, there has been a major shift in how several activities were done throughout the planet. Speaking in terms of architecture, we now possess some technologically advanced materials which have now become the ‘only’ options for building construction. This eventually led the world into energy crisis, resource exploitation, global warming, cultural loss, etc. This project is an attempt to restore balance to the planet, by creating awareness among smaller communities on the significance of their own cultural heritage. It is a proposal for a campus at Mahabalipuram,” explains the architect, who is also the finalist from Chennai for Nippon Paint’s 2019 AYDA Awards (India) edition.

Agaraadhi is a habitat restitution project, which studies and analyses the reasons for the cultural and environmental loss at Mahabalipuram. “After analysing the problems faced by the native communities, I understood that these problems came into place after their access to commons was denied by the authorities. This project takes into account the opinions of the native residents which demand the need for a community-oriented institution which has opportunities for starting from infants to senior citizens to help them get accustomed to their own culture,” he tells DT Next.