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Aurobindo Galaxy Tower, at Hyderabad, by CnT Architects

Aurobindo Galaxy Tower, at Hyderabad, by CnT Architects

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CnT Architects

CnT Architects (earlier known as Chandavarkar & Thacker Architects Pvt Ltd.) traces its roots back to being Bangalore's first architectural firm with its practice founded by the late Mr Narayan Chandavarkar in 1947. The firm is currently run by Prem Chandavarkar and Mehul Patel.

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This is the entry for a design competition for an office tower of about 1.4 million square feet in a prominent location in Hyderabad. The site was very linear in shape, and given the proportion of the land, the challenge was how to create a form that was relevant as well as memorable.

CnT has always looked at the design of office buildings as creating a space for community, where inhabitants do not feel sealed within glass boxes, and have a connection to outdoors and something larger than their immediate workspace, whichever level they may be at. The solution was to create a terraced building, where the network of terraces offered three major benefits:

Relief to workspace at every level.
Cascading connections the established a weave of cafeterias and other amenities.
A striking skyline.

The design served to win this competition for CnT. The reason it remains unbuilt is that major changes to the design brief were made after the project was awarded, which made this specific design unfeasible.

  • Aurobindo
    Concept-Evolution
  • Aurobindo
    Terraces-Concept

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Rupali Gupte

Rupali Gupte is an architect and urbanist based in Mumbai, Professor at the School of Environment and Architecture (SEA) and a partner at BARDStudio. Her work often crosses disciplinary boundaries and takes different forms – writings, drawings, mixed-media works, story telling, teaching, curation, walks and spatial interventions.

Her works include extensive research on contemporary Indian urbanism with a focus on architecture and built environment; tactical practices; housing; and urban form. In 2013, she co-founded the School of Environment and Architecture (sea.edu.in). SEA is envisaged as an experimental academic space for research and education in architecture and urbanism. She has a wide range of publications, has delivered lectures and been on juries across the world. Her works in collaboration with her partner Prasad Shetty, have been shown in several exhibitions including the 56th Venice Biennale, X Sao Paolo Architecture Biennale, Seoul Biennale of Art and Architecture, at Manifesta 7 in Bolzano, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Barcelona and at galleries such as Project 88, Devi Art Foundation and the Mumbai Art Room. She has recently curated an exhibition involving artists and architects titled ‘When is Space? Conversations in Contemporary Architecture’ at the Jawahar Kala Kendra.

Rupali Gupte