Chandigarh’s Capitol Complex is the administrative heart of the Indian states of Punjab and Haryana. Le Corbusier designed the main buildings of Sector 1 himself. We took a tour a few weeks ago.
The Assembly seen from the water ponds on the eastern side
We did a pitstop in Chandigarh last week to look at what is touted to be the most successful planned city of the second half of the twentieth century. Here, Le Corbusier and others had the tabula rasa situation they so craved to realise their utopian vision of urban life.
One building caught my eye while walking through Bangalore. It is the tall tower of the Visvesvaraya Centre complex by Charles Correa. Unbeknownst to me at the time, its equally interesting yet shorter sibling lies to the north along Amebdkar Road.
Mumbai is home to one of India’s richest men, Mukesh Ambani. His residence is probably the most extreme spatial manifestation of the super rich. His Antilia residence towers 170 meters above the city.
To me, Delhi remains tricky to make sense of as a space. This has to do with the way that I experience the city as well as its idiosyncratic layout and design. Fortunately I had a good guide with me this time, whose author I was also privileged to meet for a chat.
State Trading Corporation, Raj Rewal Associates (1989)
Besides Le Corbusier, Pierre Jeanneret, Maxwell Fry and Jane Drew there were various Indian architects who helped build Chandigarh. Among them was Aditya Prakash. One of his buildings is the Neelam Cinema in Sector 17.
As my business partner and I are beginning to plan a trip to India around election time (April/May) I tuned into a recent Asia Society event with great interest. It was all the more interesting as my wife and I explore opportunities of going to India for a longer period of time once we’re done over here in the US.
The Mausoleum of Itmad-ud-Daulah, Agra, India
A photo of the Taj Mahal in Agra can’t really capture the magic of the place. Despite the myriad visitors I found the place to be serene. I was lucky in that the light on the day of our visit was not too bright, bringing to the fore the magic glow of the marble used to build the tomb.
My wife and I are on a short stopover in India, where we are meeting her family. We spent two nights in Varanasi, a holy city on the banks of the river Ganges. Two boat trips revealed the changing face of the Ghats – the stairs leading to the water – and the activity surrounding them. The views were most beautiful just after sunrise and I thought I’d share a few of them without too much of the regular commentary.
