Instated by the Re-thinking The Future group since 2014, these new age awards are given away for design excellence and innovation with particular emphasis on and sensitivity towards climatic, environmental and sustainability factors, i.e. future preparedness for climate change on a precariously poised planet. Since its inception, the competition has achieved considerable worldwide participation and has seen both, world-renowned firms as well as fresh young teams, conferred with the coveted honours. This year, these Global Architecture and Design Awards (GADA 2018) were given away to 35 winners in different categories, an equal number of runners-up and many in the category of honourable mentions adjudged by an internationally influential jury panel.

Nandanam is a kindergarten designed by PATH (Planning and Architecture Towards Holistic Development) on the principles of holistic learning for the children of the inmates of Auroville. The township of Auroville in Puducherry, in the south Indian state of Tamilnadu, was founded in 1968 by Mirra Alfassa, a disciple of the spiritual leader Shri Aurobindo and herself revered as the Mother. This town’s mission is to facilitate ideal harmonious living among citizens from all over the world, and is recognised as the world’s only successful and longest experiment in human unity. The practices of the thriving international architectural community at Auroville are, needless to say, equally idealistic and innovative, having produced several notable examples of building with indigenous technologies and alternative materials with the prayer/ meditation centre at Matri Mandir, a futuristic spherical structure covered in golden discs, as the spiritual centre of the township. 

Nandanam was sought to be built when the existing kindergartens fell short of capacity to take in the children of this growing community at Auroville. As architects, the PATH team which took up the project in 2006 and completed it in four phases in 2014, faced the first challenge in integrating a renewed brief and refreshed ideas with the design language of an existing structure, a part of the school which was built earlier by others. Notwithstanding, the nearly 1000 sq m of Nandanam laid out in a circle around a central courtyard on the 6000 sq m plot has turned out into an inspiring, encouraging and nurturing playfield where children can learn through experience and exploration of the environment that is as limitless as a child’s imagination.

With the shade of an old neem tree forming the bonding nucleus of the circular courtyard, a continuous semi-covered corridor revolves around it, intermittently lined with various activities, likened to a street by the designers. Abutting the other side of this encircling corridor are the classrooms or activity rooms, interspersed with open spaces that ensure visual connection and air movement through and through the entire layout. While the roof of the passage is occasionally punctured with circular cut-outs, each of its pillars is painted a different bright colour, perhaps colour coding the activity in the associated corner while adding warmth and pep to the children’s world!

The exposed brick structure of the individual blocks is topped by roofs that curve as they lift upwards to bring the air and sky into their interiors. Gaily painted steel trusses hold up these low roofs and double up as posts for the children’s handiwork to be hung up for display. An array of earthen pots embedded into centre of the roof slab multitasks to reduce its weight while acting as a thermal buffer to keep interiors cool.

Equally cheerfully designed grills adorn the large windows with low sills that make way for more contact with nature outdoors and for more sun and air to come indoors. Each room opens out further onto its own outdoor space with a sand pit. More circular punctures in walls around different spaces can be observed forming different patterns and offering varying opportunities for curious interactions.

This very interactive language of Nandanam’s architecture articulates the design team’s conceptual clarity that derives from Auroville’s approach to early education based on the belief that children in this age group need to be facilitated with the opportunity to grow freely and naturally, rather than be provided with instructive hammering to suit others’ requirements. They learn at this stage by making maximal use of their own senses to observe, associate, play and interact, to thereby draw out the noblest of what is already present within them.

The mind is a storehouse of memories, of which the most important and developmentally influential ones are collected during childhood interactions with one’s surroundings. It is the sensitivity with which these surroundings for Nandanam’s children have been created that makes this designer’s effort stand out. Shailaja’s team at PATH has tucked in so many little interactive opportunities in every nook and corner – trees and plants to enjoy, sand to rollick in, sun beams to catch, little walls to climb, holes to burrow in and play peek-a-boo, individualities of parts of the campus to identify with, colours, textures and materials to enhance tactile and visual experiences, the list is quite endless. 

Nandanam, true to its name, promises to be that joyful learning ground for a tender mind to explore, experience and bloom into a limitless persona. Kudos, PATH, for your sensitive handling of this design as well as its passionate and detailed execution. Many congratulations for this well-deserved win and wishing for many more...