Working with Glass

Surface Reporter, India's 1st 'Material-centric' magazine for exterior-interior products & projects, shared the experiences of the veterans in working with glass. The spotlight was on Aashish Karode & Sushil Karer, Principal Architects, Design Atelier who too shared their experiences of working with Glass. Here is excerpt from this feature:

OUR EXPERIENCE WITH GLASS: 

Our design has always endeavored to work with craft, light, air, water, natural environment and technology as if they are materials in the construction of space. The use of glass to delineate the inside allows the exterior or outdoors to seamlessly penetrate the inside spaces becoming one aspect of the “whole” thing. The user are always able to register this as the major move by the architects, that actually enliven the spaces to be more than just rooms, and the form to be way more than just building construction.

CHALLENGES FACED WITH GLASS: 

The use of glass comes with multiple challenges in practice and these are not just about fragility as a material. Constraints of size and transportation, lack of highly specialized converters for operations involving combinations of glass. Lack of specialists with application and process knowledge, Weather resistance, Conversions in specialized applications like underwater, Safety, Deflection and Performance in solar applications are the major challenges we face in practice.

OUR MESSAGE TO GLASS MANUFACTURERS: 

Glass manufacturers could provide clear graphical and numerical information and samples kits for architectural practices. They also need to develop local Application centres where special sizes and special applications can be methodically developed for architectural applications with reasonable costs and time bound project deliveries.

Design Atelier is a well known architecture firm based in New Delhi. Spanning across Architecture, Campus Design and Master planning, Housing, Hospitality, Retail and Workplace Design, the firm has developed around 250 projects till date. Their most notable glass projects include Indian Oil Refinery, Panipat, Athena, Gurgaon, Bhai Twins Corporate Tower, Noida and Lohia Group Corporate Tower.