Balkrishna V.Doshi belongs to the generation of architects that commenced working soon after India’s independence in 1947. Influenced by the thinkers of the independence movement, Doshi’s career is devoted to establishing an identity for the contemporary Indian architecture, and he has accomplished this by rooting his work in the regional context, marrying his designs with the local environment, and building on India’s rich architectural and building traditions.

Born in 1927 in Poona (Pune), a city near Bombay (Mumbai), Doshi was raised in a religious family that was engaged in the traditional carpentry business. Observing his drawing skills, his art teacher encouraged him to pursue architectural education. In 1947, Doshi joined the J.J. School of Art in Bombay; unhappy with the course of studies, he quit the program in 1950 and decided to go to London, where he met Le Corbusier at CIAM (Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne). Following that meeting, Doshi moved to Paris to work with Le Corbusier, who at that time was designing the city of Chandigarh and other large Indian commissions as well as his influential European projects, such as La Tourette and Jaoul House. Profoundly influenced by Le Corbusier’s work, Doshi returned to India in 1955 to look after the master’s projects in Chandigarh and in Ahmedabad, where he also chose to settle.

The first decade of Doshi’s work was strongly influenced by the work of Le Corbusier, including key projects from this era, such as the low-cost housing for the workers of the Ahmedabad Textile Industry Research Association (ATIRA) and the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL; 1957) in Ahmedabad and the Institute of Indology (1957), also in Ahmedabad. The Institute of Indology is an exposed-concrete structure with sun breakers and large overhangs or “parasols,” devices used by Le Corbusier in his Indian buildings. However, in this project Doshi also managed to make a regional architectural statement. The building is subdivided into small units and looks like it could have been built using wooden post-and-beam elements. Large verandas and natural cooling and ventilation also remind us of the traditional wooden havalies, half-timber courtyard dwellings of Guajart. Moreover, the refined proportions, fine workmanship, and elegant finishes of the Indology Institute make it more delicate compared to Le Corbusier’s béton bru t style of Indian projects.

The second phase of Doshi’s practice was tempered by the work of the great American architect Louis I.Kahn. Doshi invited Kahn to design the facilities for the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) complex in Ahmedabad. From the beginning of 1960s until the sudden death of Kahn in 1974, Doshi and he remained close friends and associates. This relationship touched Doshi’s work in several ways: his use and choice of materials became refined, the play of geometry in his buildings got richer, and buildings started to demonstrate great depth and concern for light and shade and spirituality, all hallmarks of Kahn’s work. Some key buildings from this phase of Doshi’s work include the Township (1964) for Gujarat State Fertilizers in Baroda (Vadodra), the School of Architecture (1966, first phase) in Ahmedabad, the Township (1968) for the Electronics Corporation of India in Hyderabad, and the Parikh Residence (1974) in Ahmedabad. Kahn’s design influence is evident in two township projects in which Doshi employed simple but efficient load-bearing wall structures and clean geometry to organize unit plans and to control the entry of light into each dwelling. Doshi’s School of Architecture building, with its heavy load-bearing brick walls and industrial north lighting, also closely resembles Kahn’s IIM complex, its dormitory and classroom areas in particular.

Doshi’s active involvement in education coincides with his second phase of practice. In 1962, he and several colleagues established the Ahmedabad School of Architecture, which has become the Center of Environmental Planning and Technology, comprised of schools of planning, interior design, and building construction and a visual arts center. Doshi is also the founder and director of the Vastu-Shilpa Foundation, a nonprofit group for studies and research in environmental design. Doshi has regularly served as a visiting professor at most leading American and European universities, inspiring a new generation of designers and planers.

The last 25 years of Doshi’s architectural work has been the most exuberant, and no doubt the richest, phase of his work. This architecture owes little to his mentors and more to the cultural and building traditions of India. Projects from this time blend beautifully with their surroundings and, more important, convey a sense that they are somehow Indian. Important projects from this phase are the Indian Institute of Management (1977) in Bangalore; the Administrative Complex (1979) for the Madhya Pradesh Electricity Board in Jabalpur; Sangath (1979), the architect’s own office, in Ahmedabad; the Gandhi Labor Institute (1980) in Ahmedabad; Aranya low-cost housing (1983) in Indore; and the Diamond Bourse (1994) in Bombay (Mumbai).

Aranya is truly a model housing project for a developing nation such as India. A 6500- plot development, 65 percent of which is reserved for very poor clients, Aranya is inspired by the traditional lifestyle and patterns of living observed in low-income neighborhoods. To maintain marketability of high-income plots and to avoid segregation, each income groups’ plots are configured around a sophisticated arrangement of plots and public open spaces in concentric rings in six distinct sectors. Large open spaces are avoided, but that space is evenly distributed in small parcels to accommodate various cottage industries and the spillover of home-based income generation. The principles of Doshi’s recent architectural projects are also uniquely inspiring. Architecture is not entirely form related but is ordered by simple principles, such as the systemic collection and shedding of rainwater in the design of Sangath and the Gandhi Labor Institute and the apparently irregular fanning of the towers to maximize natural lighting in the offices of the Diamond Bourse. The use of simple design parti allows Doshi to compose his buildings as a loose approximation of traditional places and to build them in harmony with the climate, culture, and construction practices of India, making his projects captivating and memorable.

VIKRAM BHATT 

Sennott R.S. Encyclopedia of twentieth century architecture, Vol.1 (A-F).  Fitzroy Dearborn., 2005.

26 August 1927 Born in Poona, India;

1946 Attended Fergusson College, Poona;

1946–50 studied at the J.J. School of Art, Bombay;

1951–57 Senior designer with Le Corbusier, Paris, for major buildings in Chandigarh and Ahmedabad, India;

1954–57 represented Le Corbusier and supervised his projects in Ahmedabad;

1955 Married Kamala Parikh: 3 children;

from 1956 Private practice, Ahmedabad;

1956–77 practiced under the firm name of Vastu-Shilpa;

1958, 1960, 1964, 1967, 1977, 1980 Visiting professor, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri;

1962–72 Founder and honorary director, School of Architecture, Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology, Ahmedabad;

1964, 1967, 1968, 1977, 1982, 1984 visiting professor, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia;

1967–71 Member, Team X;

from 1971 member, Advisory Board, Architecture +Urbanism, Tokyo;

1971 fellow, Indian Institute of Architects;

1971 fellow, Royal Institute of British Architects 1971; honorary fellow, American Institute of Architects;

1972–76 member, Building International, London;

1972–78 founder and honorary director, honorary dean, School of Planning, Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology, Ahmedabad;

1973–74 vice president, Council of Architecture, Government of India;

from 1975 member, Scientific and Technical Advisory Council, Kent State University, Ohio;

from 1977 senior partner, Stein, Doshi, and Bhalla, Ahmedabad and New Delhi;

1977 visiting professor, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign;

1977 visiting professor, Rice University, Houston, Texas;

from 1978; founder and director, Vastu-Shilpa Foundation for Studies and Research in-Environmental Design;

from 1981 dean emeritus, Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology, Ahmedabad;

1984 Paul Philippe Cret Professor of Architecture, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia;

from 1984 founder and honorary director, Kanoria Centre for the Arts, Ahmedabad;

1987 distinguished professor, School of Architecture and School of Planning, Ahmedabad;

1991 visiting professor, Berlage Institute, Amsterdam, the Netherlands;

1995 Aga Khan Award for Architecture;

1998 member, steering committee, Aga Khan Awards for Architecture;

24 January 2023  Died, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India.

Selected Publications

“Planning for a Community—Vidyadhar Nagar,” (August 1990) 

Further Reading

Belluardo, James, and Kazi Khaleed Ashraf (editors), An Architecture of Independence: The Making of Modern South Asia: Charles Correa, Balkrishna Doshi, Muzharul Islam, Achyut Kanvin de, New York: Architectural League of New York, 1998

Bhatt, Vikram, “Architecture for a Developing India,” Harvard Design Magazine (Summer 1999) Bhatt, Vikram, and Peter Scriver, After the Masters: Contemporary Indian Arch itecture, Ahmedabad: Mapin, 1990

Curtis, William J.R., Balkrishna Doshi: An Architecture for India, New York: Rizzoli, 1988

Lang, Jon T., Madhavi Desai, and Miki Desai, Architecture and Independence: The Search for Identity— India, 1880 to 1980, Delhi and New York: Oxford University Press, 1997

Steele,James,RethinkingModernismfortheDevelopingWorld: TheCompleteArchitectureofBalkrishnaDoshi, NewYork:WhitneyLibraryofDesign,andLondon:Thames and Hudson, 1998 

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