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Ghosts: Collage of Memories of a Site

Part 2 Project 2008
Deepti Talpade
 Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute Mumbai | India
The thesis began with an exploration of the idea of GHOSTS. I began to look at ghosts as wraiths made of both memory and desire, and laid this idea on the city to read “sites”.
Sites get their meaning and identity from the memories that people have had of them. A new forced built intervention on a site deprives it of its desire to hold back certain collective memories and eventually the historical identity that used to unite the community of the place, gets erased from the city.
The intention of the thesis is to integrate the memories of the inhabitants of a site as an ingredient to build.
I revisited the site of my ancestral home on a hilltop in Borivli in Mumbai, India and observed how present-day urban growth in the area identified with this site. Fragmented memories of all inhabitants from the past to the present were superimposed to form a collage which would build an image revealing the identity of the site. Certain palimpsests formed memory containers around which operations were performed to accommodate the new programmatic needs of the community as well as represent architecturally spaces that refer to their collective memories. The collage allowed me to refresh and integrate certain old programs into the new one to build a programmatically sustainable model for the site.



Deepti’s project explored the gap between memory, desire and experience in the city. Through an exploration of her own history and memories of her ancestral home she was able to explore how we re-imagine the city through metaphor.

The history of the site was a difficult tumultuous one as every generation left traces of itself upon it. From being the home of a rich landowner through land acquisitions by the colonial rule and then by the State, it had due to the neglect of the State become a site for migrant labour to find a home in the city. Underneath the vibrant chaos of the slum, even today one can still find fragments from all of these times. Today the site is preparing for reconstruction and a school is to be built displacing the current inhabitants. This erasure was what Deepti wanted to address. The ‘genius loci’ of the site was thus made up of not merely the physical phenomenon but also the layers of time as existent in the memories that the site contained.

Deepti’s ability to look unflinchingly at both – her own past and her relationship to the site was exemplary. The design process was almost purgatory in the way that her own presumptions were challenged regarding the role of the architect, private desire and public need.

2008
“Ghosts” are simply constructs or forms of the pre-existing body. When desires of a body are deprived,memories construct their ghosts.Snapshots and records of my ancestral home construct an image of how the site must have been ago.
Location of the site.
The site is approached by exploring the layers of memories and desires of past and present inhabitants. These collective memories are delayered chronologically to reveal memory containers in physical forms existing on the site.
COLLAGE OF MEMORIES AND DESIRES OF THE INHABITANTS OF THE SITE
The new program for the body of the site emerges from the present needs of the site and the architecture attempts to represent its new form by operating on the memory containers.One experiences the present program yet refers to memories of its past.
The old bungalow is reused as a library and canteen space for the technical school.The ruined bungalow walls are repaired and operations are performed around them such that memories about the space and form, appear like an apparition to the present users.
The long rectangular administration building protects the old barrack plinth while the gridded translucent form identifies with the old barracks.
The dormitory has a louvered wall running parallel to the old rigid stone fort wall , such that there is a dialectic within the space between the two walls in terms of light and shadow.
As per twists and turns in the existing contours, the planes fold and open up making spaces below for workshops as a part of the school activity.
The terrace gardens for floriculture, over the workshops bring back the memory of stepped gardens of the bungalow that used to exist earlier on the slopes.
The peculiar linearity in the existing shops is maintained and further emphasized in the new shops by linear skylights and movement.
From memories and desires of the inhabitants of the site emerges a ghost form which adapts to the present needs of the community.
Slicing through the new skin to reveal memory containers.
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