Banduk Smith Studio

Keeping all the land we can…breaking ground on a new public project in the gardens of Gandhinagar






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The pluses of participating! We met a whole new set of people working on and in urban heat!

Thanks again and

Thermal portrait of Sachin Bandukwala and Melissa Smith from BandukSmith Studio by Philippe Rahm

HEAT SINK
The Indian sun is harsh. Temperatures soar near 50 degrees in the summer, our buildings shield us. As the monsoon approaches the moisture boils the air, they must breathe. In our composite climate, our buildings compete with themselves to perform. This rotating cylinder houses a corpus of our work, elements of which are intentionally juxtaposed, cataloguing an open ended set of strategic possibilities, and exquisite, unexpected spaces that shield the sun.

Thick Wall Thick Roof
We build up the volumes of the roof and the floor as thick as we can, while reducing the mass as smartly as possible, to delay the sun’s heat from reaching inside.

Tuned Thresholds
We expand the edge of the building with sacrificial spaces that guide airflow, improve ventilation, and protect the rooms deep inside.

Loose Layers
We explode the building edge into discreet layers, blurring the inside and out with shaded, semi-shaded and open spaces.

NEF CENTRALE
The central nave houses the main exhibition, laid out in three longitudinal sections that represent three temporal moments in relation to geography: past, present, and future. The exhibition is structured transversely around four symbolic elements—water, earth, air, and fire—used to group architectural problems and solutions in response to tropical rains, floods, droughts, evaporative cooling, thermal inertia, effusivity, thermal conductivity, ventilation, thermal convection, radiant solar heat, solar protection, and more.

PAST
Located along the south wall of the Nef Centrale, this section takes the form of a curiosity gabinet, gathering historical, geological, and cultural elements from warm geographies: models and analyses of vernacular architecture, everyday objects, plants, rocks, and more.

PRESENT
This section features works by contemporary architects already practicing in warm climates. Through drawings, models, and prototypes, they share how they currently address thermal environments in their architectural work.

FUTURE
Set along the north wall of the Nef Centrale, this section presents a visionary image. The theme is Paris and the region of Ile-de-France in the year 2100—or more broadly, northern cities that have been transformed by warm climate conditions.

photographs by

We were delighted to be invited to participate in the Biennale d’architecture et de paysage d’Île-de-France this summer!

On May 7, 2025, the third edition of the Île-de-France Architecture and Landscape Biennial (Bap! 2025), France’s most important architecture event, was inaugurated in Versailles. This edition features the joint curatorship of Sana Frini, from the Mexican firm LOCUS, and Philippe Rahm, from the French firm PHILIPPE RAHM ARCHITECTES. They were selected to lead the main exhibition at the École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Versailles (ÉNSA Versailles). The exhibition is open to the public at ÉNSA Versailles from May 7 to July 13, 2025, Tuesday through Friday from 12:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m., and on weekends from 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.

Titled “4° Celsius Between You and Me,” the exhibition takes as its starting point the official statement made by former French Minister for Ecological Transition, Christophe Béchu, who announced in 2023 that France is preparing for a +4°C increase in average temperature by the year 2100. With global warming, the temperate climate of cities like Paris is expected to shift toward a subtropical climate—hot and dry in summer, mild and rainy in winter—similar to that of certain regions in southern Mexico, Tunisia, or South Korea.

For this event, the curators invited more than a dozen universities to research traditional architectural solutions developed before the use of air conditioning in warm climates. In addition, they brought together 58 contemporary studios from warm latitudes and, through an open call, selected 15 award-winning architects who imagined a vision of Paris in the year 2100 under conditions of extreme heat and intense seasonal rainfall.

We are looking for a project engineer!

Project Engineers in our team are a vital bridge between the design studio and the construction site.

We are looking for someone who is ready to work in a technically challenging, design oriented environment.

Check out our website banduksmithstudio.in, or LinkedIn for more details….

And a Monday morning throwback to the exhibition we designed and curated for conscious collective!

Committed to the idea that an exhibition should live beyond its few days, we used tuff recycled concrete blocks for the seats and plinths, and .recycles made use beautiful gaadis from secondhand sarees!

Look what arrived today!
Chair 416, by Yrjö Kukkapuro, 1967.

We found these in a stack of furniture salvaged from container ships at the Alang Shipbreaking Yard… they have come a long way.

Through a bit of sleuthing, we identified their designer, Yrjö Kukkapuro, Finnish modernist, who passed away last week at 91. What a treasure to have found a piece of his legacy, and a new life for these midcentury chairs as our new/old office takes shape.

Godrej Conscious Collective

Location: plant 13 annexe, vikhroli, mumbai
We were delighted to be able to design and curate the Godrej Design Lab Fellowship Exhibition for the Conscious Collective event this December. The project was built around the work of five fellows who are questioning conventional practices and working with new, innovative materials, products and practices that aim to sustain and improve our society’s relationship with the Earth.

Conceptually, the exhibition centered on the creation of a space that is porous, permeable, inviting, and allows for a sociality that fosters communication and an exchange of knowledge and ideas. With sustainability as the driving force for the entire exhibition, we chose to create a weld mesh and steel structure – a material that ultimately is 100% recyclable, but more importantly, a set of objects that can be utilised repeatedly over the years, which can be repurposed and played with in multiple ways.

And the age-old form of the arch was a perfect vehicle; both relatable and structurally efficient.

design team :





Godrej Design Lab Fellows:
.in


.city
.in




Moving in… happy new year!



…more to come…



PC *t7637, .n.n.a.t.i___

Parikrama :
building on heritage with contemporary methods

Solid marble panels partition the verandah from the rooms inside, brightly opaque from without, warmly glowing within.

design team





structural design


construction
bhatia

lights


PC



Parikrama :
building on heritage with contemporary methods

The dining table for ten is made with a green marble slab inlaid with semi precious stones, a stone inlay craft that Agra is famous for. Traditional embossed, patterned glass allows light through the teakwood partition between the kitchen and dining areas.

design team





construction
bhatia

furniture


PC