07-10-2014, 02:01 PM
Abstracts: Village houses may be artists' delight, and cement structures in villages may look like ugly dots in a picturesque landscape. However, while urbanites may feel that village houses should retain their traditional appearance - and therefore be made of wood, stone, mud etc. villagers themselves are quick to point to the irony in this: the well-meaning urbanites themselves have long ago abandoned traditional housing! Low cost, aesthetics, preserving traditions, and living in climatically suitable houses are all fine notions, but the durability of homes is also an important consideration. A mud house with a thatched roof needs continuous maintenance, whereas a brick and cement house is far sturdier, and has a longer life span. And villagers are as interested in the longevity of their homes as their urban counterparts. However, a traditional rural residence has important advantages - it is usually based on adaptations to the local environment, and is often built with the labour of the villagers themselves without the need for external mechanised inputs. The simplest way to build a house, in the past, was to look around for the materials needed for the structure, and begin building the structure yourself. For the construction of village homes, therefore, the challenge today is to acknowledge people's desire for long-lasting structures, and there after ask what elements of functionality, value and aesthetics can be infused into the buildings. A professional architects, like JOGLEKAR, LAURIE BAKER, etc. went beyond the standard knowledge of construction to study not just how these houses are constructed but how they are lived in. they set out to use rationalized traditional technologies and found out the new genuine technologies for rural as well as urban housing.