INDIAN INSTITUTE OF ARCHITECTS National Award 2014 Today at the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai the IIA honored Christopher Charles Benninger with his Fifth National Award for Architecture; More than any other architect has ever won! The project, Forbes Marshall Industrial Pavilion is described below: Forbes Marshall Manufacturing Pavilion at Chakan * * * * * The Manufacturing Pavilion at Chakan is part of a larger Industrial Park being developed by the Forbes Marshall Group of Industries. It was designed to mirror the Forbes Marshall Group’s values and attributes, reflecting high technology, perfection and global standards. It also had to be an exemplary social statement of commitment to safety, hygiene and sustainability, translating into a “great place to work” that engenders loyalty, pride and commitment. The work areas were conceived to be like creative studios, rather than mere factory sheds, bringing daylight and growing plants within the working floor environments. All of the manufacturing pavilions situated within the campus master plan gather about a large pedestrian garden that acts as a visual retreat, integrating element, as well as a break out space where catering facilities, recreation and outdoor meeting areas are situated. A lineal water body meanders from east to west, within this verdant retreat linking the corporate offices to the places of making things! Most important the large manufacturing pavilion, where state of the art boilers are created, is a vast manufacturing machine. All of the components and elements of this machine are well tempered, considered and articulate. Sequencing and movement; plan and process; structure and mechanical systems; fenestration and ventilation; lineal mass production bays, gantries and heavy equipment; entries and exits; trusses, columns and purlins; roof skin, skylights, south-facing jaali walls and north-facing wavy glass walls; storage, work and office spaces; are all lattices, networks and systems inter-related and optimized in an efficient balance. The intent of the architect falls within several inter-connected layers of purpose. At a very basic level each building on the site is a “machine for working” in its own right, and must be highly functional, extremely efficient, durable and easy to maintain. At another level all of the structures are players within an overall campus and they must be situated within that campus in a manner that optimizes synergies amongst the various parts. Movement within the campus gifts access for delivery of raw materials, movement to storage and packing areas, and final shipping out. The pedestrian inner garden and the vehicular movement are separated for safety and peace of mind. This system defines active and passive areas; noisy and quiet areas; doing and thinking areas. Professor Benninger, reflecting on the design process noted, “As an architect I would like that the most unskilled worker and the most senior manager would feel a sense of pride in their common place of work. This mutually held ‘presence’ should engender bonds of community and purpose. Positive emotions of pleasant anticipation should swell up as they approach their place of work each morning. A visitor should feel they are within a global company’s environment when they reach the Forbes Marshall campus, yet there must be ‘signifiers’ that tell them that they are in a place called Pune.”
Posted on: Sat, 13 Dec 2014 18:05:42 +0000
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