“One has to open up to the skies... only then will your buildings look up to light and ventilation in a scientific way,” renowned architect Charles Correa (84), who passed away in Mumbai on Tuesday, had said during one of his visits to Bengaluru.
His last visit to the city was in November 2014 when he participated in Architecture Paradigm’s “In Conversation”. At the event, he conversed with art historian Jyotindra Jain on art and architecture and their role in shaping the built environment and urban landscape.
“Charles Correa stands tall as a creator of both form and space,” says architect Sathya Prakash Varanashi. “Those who frequented the earlier Fab India showroom in Koramangala walked around the house which Correa designed for his stay in Bengaluru. The fact that a house gets the new avatar as a shop, without losing its spirit, shows the flexibility with which the house has been conceived.”
After post-graduation from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the mid-1950s, Correa set up his firm in Mumbai and for five decades added value to community living standards as the chief architect of ‘Navi Mumbai’ and as chairperson of the National Commission on Urbanisation.
The Hyderabad-born architect had strong links with Bengaluru. Some of his well-known buildings in Bengaluru are the Jawaharlal Nehru Science Centre, off Jakkur; the house that he built for his daughter at Koramangala where Fab India presently operates from; and the renowned LIC Tower or the Visvesvaraya Centre where his exposed concrete work comes into reference for architects even 40 years after it was built.
He had strong views on the laying of the Metro on M.G. Road. “The track on M.G. Road should have gone underground; or at least the elevated part should have been in steel instead of the ugly concrete expressions with gigantic pillars running all along,” Mr. Correa had said in an interview with The Hindu .
He, however, wanted the Metro running on an elevated track, especially on the Vidhana Soudha Road. “Although I haven’t studied the buildings and the flow pattern near the Vidhana Soudha, it could have proved a heavenly addition to be above-ground. I can visualise the rail running 20 feet above the ground in steel, this gossamer being a typical contemporary narrative adding to the drama amidst the traditional looking State Assembly and the Karnataka High Court,” he had said.
