The Hindu Business Line : Restored pride

Every day is a challenge, and I look forward to meeting it,” says Brinda Somaya. The principal architect of Somaya & Kalappa Consultants for the last two decades, she has serviced corporate, industrial and institutional clients in Mumbai.

Brinda is today involved in Progressive Conservation and the project dearest to her heart is her alma mater, the Cathedral and John Connon School. Born into an erudite family, Brinda chose architecture because her sister had chosen it. “Later I realised that at a subconscious level I was meant to be an architect. I used to pass all the heritage structures while going to school as a child and somewhere these structures made a mark on me.”

Some of the buildings restored by Brinda Somaya in Mumbai.

She has won heritage awards for her work on the Cathedral Schools and the NRK House in Parel. She has also restored the 17th-century St. Thomas’s Cathedral, in Horniman Circle, which won her a UNESCO prize in 2004.

Her involvement in community projects includes the restoration of Bhadli village in Gujarat in 2001.

After her graduation from the JJ School of Architecture, Brinda got her master’s degree in the US. After marriage, she didn’t concentrate on making a career. “I was lucky that it just happened when our family moved to Mumbai,” she reminisces. At 25, she was thrilled to get her first independent job to design a factory.“I believe that one must love one’s work. It is the key to success. Of course, there will be problems in all fields, but one must have an open mind, avoid arrogance and suppress one’s ego,” she says. She credits her family for their unstinting support throughout her career, and says without support from the family a woman cannot give her best to her career. “When I used to travel, my husband was always supportive and I am very grateful to him,” she says.

Today her daughter Nandini has joined her business after completing her studies abroad. Commenting on the challenges and opportunities for architects in India, she says, “There must be few countries in the world where architects have such varied challenges as we have in South Asia today. Our involvement ranges from upgrading slums to large corporate and public buildings, from low-income housing to the restoration of magnificent indigenous and colonial buildings.”

She thinks the architect’s role is that of a guardian, as he/she is the conscience of the built and un-built environment, and believes that development and progress must proceed without straining the cultural and historical environment. In 2000, she established HECAR Foundation to celebrate Mumbai’s historic tradition. An acronym for Heritage Education Conservation Architecture Restoration, it seeks to educate people about heritage and urban issues.

She says she derives the greatest fulfilment from her work in Progressive Conservation. The Cathedral and John Connon School is a prime example of Victorian Gothic architecture in the historic Fort area. This conservation effort seeks to demonstrate how the other historic areas of the city can renew themselves through focused environment-conscious (and history-sensitive) architecture. She stresses that her involvement in conservation is neither self-indulgent nor reverential, but an intelligent meshing of the old and new to develop an architectural form that serves the present.

“We must build with a sense of place. Every building has to be designed with the context of the site, client requirement and to raise the spirit. People must know where they are. If every building looks alike, whether it is in Singapore or Shanghai, then something is wrong. Architects must look into the context, what’s right for that place, for that country and what has been the historic tradition in architecture.”

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