When an industrial facility is designed, the future direction of the industry must be considered. Thus the expansion and future needs of the facility are an important consideration. In any large industrial design, the synergy between architecture and engineering is critical.
In an interview, Mr. S.K. Nandi, Director, C.P. Kukreja Associates Pvt. Ltd. explains the industrial architecture scenario and the thinking process involved in the designing of industrial buildings. Following are excerpts from the interview.
Q. How industrial architecture grew in India and what is the present scenario?
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Industrial architecture in India has a historical aspect. It came to India along with the British. When they were establishing their roots in India, they needed lot of industrial raw material, Initially they were importing industrial raw materials from Britain, but this gave them lot of problems such as long time taken to bring materials from Britain and excessive cost involved in importing them. Enterprising Indians found this situation very conducive for them and started industries. This is how some of the industries started in India. But the architectural methods they used were very primitive. In short what happened was that the Indian entrepreneurs went to the source of raw materials and acquired some machinery and built structures around the machines just to house the machines. But unfortunately no thought process was involved in the building of these structures. This continued through second world war uptil the independence of the nation.
The second phase started after independence. At this point of time a second generation of industrialists who had got training from abroad got accustomed to modern buildings. They became very eager to come back to India and inject these new technologies into India.
They became aware of the importance of proper planning. However, at that time we had certain constraints such as absence of free flow of money, lack of sophisticated technology and strong government control. Due to these problems technology could not be imported directly. Thus the era of collaborations started. This brought certain amount of modernism in the thought process of entrepreneurs. This participation was very limited, for the entrepreneurs wanted to copy some of the technologies prevalent in the western world.
With the economic liberalisation, a new era started and a sense of participation at the global level was initiated. The 90s have witnessed this third phase in industrial architecture in India with the coming of joint ventures and direct participation of multi-national companies. These MNCs like Daewoo, Honda, Philips, Smithkline, Hyundai, etc have their own norms and standards of building design. Consequently, the criteria of acceptability here has reached a global level. To meet the corporate standards of such companies, the immediate fallout is the need and urgency of input of architect from the concept stage.
Q. What are the important parameters kept in mind while building an industrial facility?
The most important factor is time. With the entry of the multi national corporations (MNC's) and increased competition in the market, time has become very important. You will have to plan your venture in such a way that it fits into the marketing plans of the company or firm you are working for. A lot of thinking process goes in to calculate the exact amount of time available. We have to work backwards from the date of S.O.P. (Start of Production). We also have to keep in mind the time allocated for trial run of the product. Depending on all these factors we actually arrive at a date at which, internally the building is ready, and this date can be several months before the date of S.O.P. So you see, we really work on a very tight time frame. Another most important factor is cost. Your design will have to stick to the original estimates. Two things you can not allow in an industrial building are time overrun and cost over run. Time over run can really cost you the market you are aiming at and cost over run is hard for any industrialist.
You should keep the international standards also in mind while designing an industrial facility. This is more important in this era of joint ventures and collaborations. Your plans should meet international standards. Another matter of great importance is the constraint of space. Your design should be able to utilise the available space to the optimum level. There should be proper care in selecting the building materials. You must use material in such a way that recurring cost is very little.
Again, the type of industry also matters in the selection of material for construction. One has to use materials that prevent the entry of dust inside the complex as most of the industries are highly sophisti cated.
You must also keep functional as well as dimensional requirements of the setup in mind while designing. The plan should take future growth or expansion plans of the set up into consideration. You cannot alter or make improvements in the structure every now and then. Along with this the production parameters of the set-up are also equally important.
Q. The building that house should be able to make the worker feel at home. What are the steps taken in this regard?
Another thing we learned from foreigners is the philosophy of work place. This concept was totally missing in our country. We have also started designing buildings to make the worker who works in that factory for ten to twelve hours a day for many years, feel at home in the work place. We have realised that if the worker feels comfortable in the factory his efficiency goes up considerably.Research has proved that can increase the production capacity of workers. Your building must have temperature levels that are comfortable for workers. Proper availability of natural light inside the complex is another factor that an architect should keep in mind while designing buildings. Once you have climatic control then the comfort of the worker is achieved and with higher levels of comfort the efficiency of the worker also goes up automatically. Another factor we realised was that the colour that is used inside the building can also affect the efficiency of the worker to a great extent. We realised while doing
one of our projects that with proper management of light we can make those machines which otherwise look loathsome and boring, appear more friendly. Better light management inside building can bring a better mood for the worker.
Q. What are the reactions to modern methods of architecture in a traditional country like India ? Do people still have reverence for the Vasthusastra?
People in India and South East Asia still care for the Vasthusastra. Since it has some religious connection it becomes more important. According to the sastras if you ignore some of the principles, the result can be disastrous. As people in our country have still reverence for the sastras some times people insist on constructing buildings according to them. We also ask our Indian clients to discuss with their Vasthusastry before the starting of the project to avoid later alterations in the structure.
Q. Are there any bottle necks that you face now?
Yes, the first one is that the time we have got to adjust to international standards is very little. We are asked to adjust with these standards in four or five years where as one really needs fifteen to twenty five years. Second is to make the MNC's aware of the Indian context since most of the MNC's insist on implementing the accepted standards of their countries forgetting that the Indian conditions are entirely different. They tend to forget that some buildings standards cannot be applied in our context since climatic conditions vary completly.
Another difficulty we have is time frame. Construction work is highly affected by weather conditions. In India since we have a very cyclic weather condition. Due to certain social factors the work force is also not available in our country for some part of the year. The MNC's do not understand these issues and we have to meet the stringent time schedule. Apart from all these we have umpteen unexpected problems such as strikes, volatile political and economic conditions which are very peculiar to India.
Q. What do you think the future will be?
I certainly believe that industrial architecture has a very bright future in India. With the opening up of the Indian economy we have new industrial set-ups which require most modern architectural techniques.
Proper planning not only for the present but also for the future needs have become the order of the day. In such a situation this specialised branch of architecture has an important role to play.