Space Design Consultants (SDC) provide a wide range of architectural and interior design services across India and to a smaller extent in the USA. It provides urban planning, architecture and interior design services for residential, industrial and commercial buildings.
Space Design Consultants have been at the forefront of sustainable and green building design in India. They aim to train young architects in the use and development of competitive methods and solutions for existing and new buildings that will contribute to lowering GHG emissions related to the production, use, management, and demolition of architecture from a life-cycle perspective.
Here are 10 sustainable projects by Space Design Consultants.
1. Gupta House
Location: Gurgaon
Year: 2012
An environmentally conscious design that aims to please the clients who are lovers of art and nature. The Gupta House is designed for the elderly couple that wants to spend more time outdoors than indoors. The central position of the house on the plot creates a summer garden in the front and a winter garden in the rear.
The winter garden receives ample light and the summer garden is shaded by a verandah and gazebo to reduce the solar glare and thermal load. The façade treatment is a bamboo canopy which is an organic shading screen to keep the area cool. A wind turbine and photovoltaic panels are also included to combat energy consumption.
2. NIIT University
Location: Neemrana
Year: 2009
The masterplan of the campus offered possibilities of approaching sustainability at urban levels and went ahead to tackle issues of social and economic sustainability. The design focuses on student centredness and as such the zoning system allows for different functions to grow linearly.
Designed as a pedestrian-friendly facility, a spine runs from the north to the south of the campus and this acts as a hotspot for student social activities. Design and construction took into appreciation site elements and minimized cut and fill creating interesting levels and shaded links. Buildings on-site use natural light, ventilation and passive cooling systems.
The views from each hostel room are designed to bring the feeling of nature into interior spaces. The natural indents found on site have been developed as an amphitheatre and another as the sports arena.
3. Science Olympiad Foundation
Location: Gurgaon
Year: 2008
This energy-efficient building maximises daylighting with the use of light shelves and external shading screens. It also uses thermal insulation in walls and roofs to reduce the heat load. The external surface is finished with recycled glass tiles.
4. Harada Demo Centre
Location: Gurgaon
Year: 2007
This is a net-zero building centre designed in Gurgaon for renewable energy technology, organized around a courtyard with a cooling tower. Serving as a demonstration centre for renewable energy technology, energy technologies like solar energy generation, solar water heating, water harvesting, are demonstrated through the building design.
5. KLG Systel Office
Location: Gurgaon
Year: 2000
The KLG Systel is designed with sustainable interior decoration by following the styling needs of the people. Space Design Consultant designed the QUAD workstations within the office to provide a unique sense of privacy with their royal blue and yellow colour scheme.
6. National Media Centre Complex
Location: Gurgaon
Year: 1996
This is a housing project with a modern aesthetic and traditional flavour. The word ‘traditional’ here is reflective of a feeling of community, trust, and involvement with the creation and growth of the inhabited space.
The design centres around a gated community by creating space for like-minded people. This provides a space that can help nurture communal identity whilst developing urban techniques that promote green building design for example zero discharge housing. Services for the site are centrally organized. Sewage disposal and garbage disposal are jointly managed. Water supply is from the tube well system.
Due to the scarcity of water in the area. The architect suggested a system where the paved areas allow rainwater to percolate into the ground. The rainwater drains are connected to a system of soak pits in the green spaces. This is a modern equivalent of the traditional rainwater harvesting system.
7. CMC Limited Building
Location: Mumbai
Year: 1992
This stood out as the first intelligent building. Space `design Consultants design a hi-tech building which presents a portal to the future, where computers control the air conditioning, lighting, security, and Venetian blinds designed to help people think, live, and work better. Presenting groundbreaking software that we now refer to as “Alexa”.
The building makes special use of daylight with an atrium located in the core of the building providing daylight into the inner space. Office spaces are centred around this atrium in helical form. ‘Man’s search for the divine’, a set of sculptures by Suruchi Chand reinforce the helical theme set around the atrium.
Externally, the building uses glass to create an image appropriate of a high-tech organisation with the use of modern materials and maintaining strict controls on energy use with the interest of future generations in mind.
8. Solar Energy Centre Guest House
Location: Gurgaon
Year: 1988
Conceived as a low spread out structure, the building is arranged around courtyards to take advantage of the evaporating cooling system on the roof. The entire structure is designed to take in as much daylight as possible. The windows were also designed to cater for cross ventilation especially in the monsoon season when evaporative cooling is not a viable option.
For comfort cooling, the strategy used was to reduce ingress of heat by using hollow, concrete block walls, properly shaded windows, and a reflective finish on the roof surface. Other sustainable strategies include a power plant, biomass plantation, and a large outdoor facility for testing solar devices.
9. Jodhpur University Hostel
Location: Jodhpur
Year: 1984
SDC attempted to test and propose suitable energy conservation measures for the hot and dry climate of Rajasthan. The design uses orientation, bulky volumes, an air gap in the roof for insulation, passive downdraft and displacement ventilation. It also balances the thermal loads with reflective external finishes, deep sunshades, and a wind tower to take advantage of the cool winds.
An experimental evaporative cooling system using wires for water distribution was also installed in the wind tower. The local light-coloured stones, terracotta roofing pots and lime concrete contribute to the building’s low embodied energy.
10. Bharti Bhawan Building
Location: Noida
Year: N/A
The office building for book publishing is designed with low energy cooling techniques and resource conservation to reduce the thermal load. This is done through insulating walls and an evaporative cooling system on the roof that uses white gravel as insulation and an evaporative medium.
Energy efficiency is maintained with verandahs and skylights. The air conditioning system within the building uses the underground water tank as a thermal storage system.
