Collage House

Living in Mumbai, India, it is impossible to ignore the informal settlements in the city. If looked at closely, there are many lessons to be learnt in frugality, adaptability, multi-tasking, resourcefulness and ingenuity. A visual language emerges that is of the found object, ad-hoc, eclectic, patched and collaged. Some of these lessons have been applied without romanticising and fetishising them in the ‘collage house’. The project looks at the idea of recycling and collage in several ways, from the very physical like materials, energy, etc., to the intangible like history, space and memories. The front façade sets the tone for what lies within, with a ‘corner of windows’ that recycles old windows and doors of demolished houses in the city. This becomes a major backdrop for the living room with an exposed concrete, faceted ceiling above countered by the polished white marble with intricate brass inlay on the floor.

A visual language emerges that is of the found object, ad-hoc, eclectic, patched and collaged

This approach is reinforced again in the interior materials and elements. It plays up this contrast between the old and the new, the traditional and the contemporary, the rough and the finished. A language emerges that is both new but strangely familiar at the same time and that makes us rethink our notions of beauty around us, which we take for granted. To make this melange more ‘acceptable’, it is encased in a ‘garb of modernity’ (Nehru). The doors and windows were all salvaged from various scrap shops throughout the city; they were sourced, selected, rehabilitated and designed to fit together as a jigsaw piece forming the main facade of this house. An intense and dedicated undertaking in the reuse of wood.

ALL PHOTO / DRAWING : COURTESY S +P.S ARCHITECTS.