Personal Journey or Tectonic Practice: Thick Descriptions of Curated Residential Interiors by Four Indian Architects

Abstract

ABSTRACT Among the handful of architectural histories charting the architectural development of the Indian Subcontinent after the decisive rupture of the 1950s, few have explored the modernist Indian interior. This paper examines the self-conscious curation of the modern domestic interior within the repertoire of four prolific and cross-culturally positioned Indian architects — Aditya Prakash (1924–2008), Balkrishna Doshi (1927–), Charles Correa (1930–2015), and Hasmukh Patel (1933–2018). Mining newly available archival insights as well as direct observation and experience of their interiors, the spatial choreographies performed within the living rooms of these architects’ family homes are reconstructed and explored. In serving as veritable repositories of life journeys and experiences, these intimate interiors marked event and discovery. In identifying the curated experiences of these interiors as spaces of encounter and dialogue between assemblies of things, we ask how such choices not only reinforced the spatial tectonics of their interior architectures but also enabled their curators to reflect upon the modes and means of their invention and inspiration as designers. Finally, we consider how these interiors, and their elements, may be comprehended as horological devices, marking the purported origin and transition points in time pertinent to the experimental journeys of their individual curators .