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The design and construction process

Begun in June 2001, the evolution of the design happened over a period of 8 months, a process which involved drawing out of the requirements and desires of the villagers in many village meetings and incorporating those things in the design within a stipulated budget.

The designs were made by the UNV architects Snehasis Tripathy and Anindya Sarkar and the construction was supervised by the UNV engineers Ram Chandra Panda and Sripati Karan.

The goal of the whole design exercise was to achieve a structurally stable, aesthetically pleasing building which the villagers could relate to. But this had to be achieved within the stipulated budget of 125 thousand rupees. Hence, a reverse approach was taken for evolving the design. The average per square foot cost of construction was arrived upon based on the rates of materials and labour. Then, based on this the calculations were made for how much area could be constructed and the plans were made to fit into that much of built up area, an exercise in which the UNVs have a fairly good experience.

By this time UNDP had already trained a team of artisans and masons in the surrounding locality. The actual construction started in February 2002 and was completed by September 2002 within the stipulated budget of 125 thousand INR.

Design enhancements
The plan of the building is made up of a main hall, with a smaller auxiliary room and a common bath and toilet. There is a verandah with a built in seat at the entrance. A flight of stairs leads to the terrace above. The ceiling of the main hall is deliberately raised two feet above the rest of the terrace floor, to act as a podium for small meetings or performances, which the villagers can conduct in the open air. Brick jali pattern are used as the parapet.

Special care has been taken to orient the building as per wind and sun direction. The building is so designed that it allows adequate light, natural cross-ventilation and cooling inside the building, reducing the dependence on active sources of energy. The entrance faces the north direction.

Attention is paid to the detailing and aesthetic beautification of the buildings to generate a sense of ownership amongst the users.

- Floor plan >
- Elevation drawings >

Materials
Most of the building materials were locally available. There were local suppliers for materials such as brick, cement, rods and tiles. However, sand and chips were brought from far away areas. The chief material used for construction is bricks. For the filler roof Mangalore tiles are used. Both these materials were made available from within 7-10km from the site and tiles. The sand and cement were made available from village store. However their use was reduced as far as possible.

Technologies >
All structural calculations confirm to the code of Indian Bureau of Standards. The Building is a single storied load bearing structure. The site being situated in a black cotton soil belt, well foundations were opted for.
- Detail of well foundations >

The walls are load bearing and made in a rat-trap bonded brick-work. As compared to a wall made in English or Flemish bond, a wall made in rat-trap bond helped reduce the cost of the wall by 19% to 25% and also helped achieve 25% reduction in the dead weight of the wall. Moreover, due to the inbuilt cavities in the wall acts as a thermal insulator, due to which the room interior is always cool, even in summer. It makes the building structurally stable and aesthetically pleasing. Applying (1:3) cement mortar pointing at the joints, helped eliminate the need of plastering the walls. The reduced number of joints helped reduce the mortar consumption and gave a 54% savings in cement and sand. This type of brick work is labour intensive which creates more livelihood opportunities for the trained masons in the rural area.

Usually the roof accounts for 25-30% of the entire building cost. By replacing the concrete in the bottom of the slab where it is structurally not required by a filler material, the cost of the slab was brought down by 12 to 15%. In this case a pair of Mangalore tiles were placed one above the other in the reinforced cement concrete slab. This helped reduce the dead weight of the slab, and the gap in between the two tiles provided thermal insulation to the room interior making it cool and also making an attractive pattern inside the room.

Arches were used extensively for all the openings. Brick arches do away with the use of expensive reinforced concrete lintels, thus reducing the use of steel and concrete in the building. Most importantly the various possibilities of arch forms helped add significant aesthetic value to the building.