Yathartha – Cultural Appropriation In The Case of Retail Architecture | Architecture Thesis

Site Context

Due to its proximity to the train station, the site has always been dominated by its retail establishment. The site provides a wide range of products and services for production and consumption, from delicious street food to groceries, auto parts, apparel, stationery, and seasonal crafts. On S.V. Road in Borivali, there is room for every skill, thought, and craft. In the last fifty years, the location has seen a variety of retail-oriented developments, including markets, malls, shopping centres, and street vendors.

By analysing these developments in light of their unique cultural context, the thesis was able to identify the idea of cultural appropriation for this particular site. The streets and homogeneous shopping centres are thriving as usual, while the recent developments in the form of malls are now empty and being used as coaching classes and warehouses. For a site with such high mobility, homogeneity, equity, and freedom of movement are essential. A further rationale for why people still choose to use the congested streets over the redundant and merely inaccessible skywalks.

The project looks at the redevelopment of a BMC vegetable market as making it the next public forum, a breeding ground for exchanges. Exchange of art, culture, crafts, goods, food, and everything else that flows through the site. An extension of the streets, a free-flowing but routed entity.

Design Process

The first set of architectural programs include the existing market operations with its ancillary functions. The market has been functioning at overload capacities since its inception in 1964. It is only imperative to reorganise and modernise the same while retaining its original architectural fabric. Since the market building has resulted in an influx of illegal hawkers, the programme aims to integrate them instead of expelling them.

As mentioned earlier the built form aims to be a public forum, where there will be a wide range of homogenous shops from food to clothing, something for everyone. The cutlery and crafts market now also invites all the skilled individuals to use this forum to sell their skills along with their goods by creating dedicated and accessible workshop areas. The workshop areas are further classified into two, the general workshop and tailoring workshop. As observed on site each clothing store is accompanied by a tailor accommodated in its false ceiling or at the back of the store. The design intends to highlight the skill of that tailor by giving dedicated workshop areas in affiliation with the shops.

By allocating anchor cafes and other programmes for a specific audience, the design aims to revitalise the upper ground (skywalk) in a seamless manner. The design programmes are then connected to a number of other public initiatives, including roof gardens, flea markets, and public plazas. Lastly, the design includes space for a distribution office to complete the retail cycle, in order to expand the audience for the dialogue created on the site.

Final Outcome

The existing market consists of linear shed spaces and a vacant plot utilised as a parking and dumping area. The redundant skywalk overlooks the market sheds but does not allow any form for seamless accessibility. The markets are organised such that there are intersecting plazas and courtyards. The ancillary functions are accommodated at the back end of the plot connected through the intersecting plazas.

The clothing shops are towards the street and food stalls at the back creating a food hub along with the temporary evening food truck plaza. Adjacent to the central courtyard is the anchor cafe. An open volume is created by the crafts market’s staggered placement relative to the cutlery market underneath.

The structure of the roof is such that it can playfully accommodate workshop areas and create a rhythm in its facade that provides shade to the hawkers underneath. The roof is designed using salvaged trusses from the existing market in order to reduce costs and time while simultaneously instilling a sense of memory the place had retained for the past 50 years.

The final form of the design consciously maintains an inward close looped circulation of customers, pedestrians and visitors. In contrast to malls, the design configures its pathways according to the familiar market model, allowing users to enter at any point and exit at any other without being restricted in their movement. Additionally, by maintaining unrestricted circulation at all levels and integrating it with the existing skywalk, it activates the redundant urban infrastructure and unifies the built form with its urban landscape.

Conclusion: This design, classified as “Yathartha”—a culturally appropriate built form in the context of retail architecture—takes a fresh look at the design of retail architecture by identifying numerous pertinent architectural programmes and their juxtaposition on site, based on a thorough analysis of the cultural landscape and retail aspirations.

[This Academic Project has been published with text submitted by the student]