Architecture As Symbol And Idea

Architecture : Weaving the aspirations and struggles of a new nation into a building A memorial to independent India’s first and most dynamic Prime Minister

- Kaiwan Mehta

The Nehru Centre in Mumbai, designed by I M Kadri, is a building dedicated to Jawaharlal Nehru and his vision. It consists of a tower defined formally as well as structurally by an exoskeleton of a diagrid; and this tower sits on a podium composed of horizontal plates foregrounded by a sloping structure of a garden. The jaali is a crucial element in the design of the structure. The circular tower emerging from three tectonic plates visually defines and represents the churning in a new nation with its struggles as well as aspirations. The jaali surfaces, on the other hand, are inspired in their detail from the rose that Nehru always wore, lending form and visual structure to the Nehru Centre building.