Sitting Under The Shade: The Public, The Private and The Sacred

Abstract

For many Indians, the hypotheses of the Vaastu Purusha mandala forms the spatial core of Indian identity. The principles of a Vaastu-Vik settlement unify being and nature, but the knowledge of unifying these principles in the contemporary world of architecture serves to provide a meaningful existence for its inhabitants. While the term Vaastu-Vik is used to define our built environment, Purusha is the cosmic man contained in a ninesquare cosmological and diagrammatic mandala that is the symbolic embodiment of our universe. This thesis is an attempt to understand and unpack the meaning behind these spatial orientations and to reveal the manner in which this information may inform contemporary architecture, particularly from a personal perspective. I also wanted to understand more about my architectural heritage. My family have been migrating for generations, rooting and un-rooting themselves in the hopes of finding stability. Firstly, from the ancestral village in Nandpur Kalour situated in northern India to a town in Kharar, Punjab and from the town to the city of Chandigarh. In each place, our family lived in multi-generation, communal houses. Now we reside in Auckland, New Zealand, away from the motherland of my forebears. I still carry memories of those past homes; the memory of tradition intrigues me and through my architectural studies, I wondered if something has been lost along the way. I wanted to explore an architecture that built on those memories of past homes, past lives. Thus, my research into my Indian heritage has explored not only the influence of the vaastu purusha mandala but also the work of well-known Indian architects, Charles Correa and Balkrishna Vithaldas Doshi. This research has enabled me to reflect upon the way vaastu is evident in various forms and interpretations, through analysis of their work. It has also allowed me to examine the architecture behind my memories of home, and to speculate on the notion of Indian-ness while being rooted within migrancy and cultural mobility. How can I bring this mix of cosmology, culture and memory together? Using the knowledge that I have gained, I will design a new home for my extended family as part of a larger multi-mix use settlement located near where we now live, in Ormiston, Flat Bush, Auckland.