Abstract:
Within contemporary architectural discourse, the importance of identity and locality has been constantly emphasized to resist the impact of globalisation. However, the concept of local identity is a paradoxical proposition not only because of the antithesis between the indigenous culture and the universal civilisation but also the fact that all cultures, both ancient and modern, seem to have depended for their inherent evolution on a cross-fertilisation with other cultures. In this sense, the practice of architecture today is as global as it is local. The air terminal, both a symptom and cause of global homogeneity, is commonly criticized as a non-place denying identity and locality. This sense of rootlessness reflects an unbearable lightness in contemporary architectural practice. As a response, this thesis acts as a research-based design practice focusing on an air terminal that abets problems: the Tenzing-Hillary Airport which brings global tourists and their trash to a remote Himalayan village Lukla. The design turning the on-site plastic waste into the brickwork of vernacular form is at once an expression of the locality and also a critical reflection of the globalisation. The problem is then recast as a means of providing a solution. As Kenneth Frampton summarized, “architecture is an existence out of the interplay of three converging vectors, the type, the site and the tectonic”. This, therefore, informs the methodology of this thesis and defines the range of the research topics. The airport typology, the vernacular architecture in Lukla, and the tectonic of the recycled-plastic brick are three major research topics of this thesis. The final proposal is a design speculation based on the prototype making of the bricks. The innovative material and its tectonic, in conjunction with the type and the site, propose an architecture that celebrates the power of rationality through its own discourse. Ultimately, the thesis attempts to seek a new possibility which recalls the fact that architecture is a substantial art having meaningful dialogue with its physical and cultural environment.