Brick Weave House / 4site architects

Brick Weave House / 4site architects

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Overview. The Brick Weave House is a home nestled in a Mixed-use Building at Cubbon pet; one of the oldest and busiest localities of Bangalore, India. House sits on a 24ft wide / 16ft deep plot, abutting an 8ft wide tight, and busy access path to its South. It is the most unique among the neighboring row houses having been designed with an attractive and functional brick-woven screen.

Brief. The challenge was to create a mixed-use typology in this tiny plot, with commercial space at the first two stories and a residential duplex over the same footprint for the bachelor client and his mother. So, House connects the two commercial stories via an external staircase, which then converts into an internal staircase for the residential duplex above.

Concept. Cubbon Peth historically housed Bangalore’s oldest handloom silk weavers’ colony. In the post-industrial revolution, hand-crafted silk weaving art is lost over a period of time. Our beloved client hails from a family of weavers and has a childhood memory of the traditional weaving systems. With the intent of preserving this tale, the idea of traditional weaving translated into brick weaving, and thus, we created the Brick Weave House.

The project is one among the many row houses of the weaver’s colonies sharing/abutting walls. The challenge of light and ventilation is only from the street side or the sky. Metaphoric to its context, the “Brick Screens” are “weaved” through MS Rods all along the fenestration of the facade. The combination of the solid brick wall and brick Weave screen blends with the old town surrounding context.

The creative design of Brick Weave Screens is made with rotation of bricks at its axis with 45,90,135 degrees that prevents pigeons/ birds and rain from getting in while retaining sufficient light and ventilation with privacy. The brick weave animates the common staircase and duplex interior with dappled sunlight, establishing little visual connection to the street from the inside while appearing mostly opaque from the outside. The brick weave screens generate polygonal voids letting in hexagonal patterns of light during the day and throwing out the same at night, hence acting as a lantern lighting up the dark alley at night.