Residential

Civic

Landscape

Commercial

Design Competitions

Interior Design

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The site neighborhood is within a walking radius of the Boudhanath Stupa and reflects Tibetan architectural influence. A few monasteries and prayer junctions are nestled in the neighborhood, creating a sense of spirituality on site. The site lies on a newly growing commercial corridor in a residential neighborhood, creating a perfect opportunity to build mix-use residential and commercial real estate.
Thus, the project is planned to maximize storefront and commercial rental space while also providing private residential spaces. The site is connected to the main commercial corridor on the NorthWest where the commercial block is planned, giving it more visibility and direct access. Similarly, the secondary road on the East which is more residential in use is used to access the apartment block creating privacy and separate access. The whole property has been planned with a basement parking accessible by both commercial and residential parts, undisturbed and secured from each other by internal partitions. The property is a single-standing volume that gets separated into commercial and residential blocks by a central courtyard, and a light well that brings in natural daylight inside the internal spaces, and also helps in passive air circulation throughout the building.
We have designed the facade of the building to showcase a fusion of exposed brickwork with the Tibetan architecture style exhibited around Bouddha. This style includes rectangular motifs, a white stucco band with cornices, and stylistic trapezoidal openings. The street facade volume is topped to maximize visibility and also consists of trapezoidal punctures for openings, which is a contemporary take on the Tibetan style of windows. The volume breaks with a full-height glass curtain wall to the west followed by a recessed brick volume continuing from the northeast to the south side. The eastern facade continues the brick theme, and the elevation is somewhat symmetrical around a central brick volume. This facade incorporates balconies, and the central volume is divided by an internal circulation corridor and balcony with vertical louvers for proper air circulation. The volume provides a humble interaction with architectural features dominant in Bouddha, all merged with exposed brickwork in the facade, giving a sense of warmth in the streetscape without overpowering the nearby monastery.
The Commercial block is designed as an open-plan rental space on each level. The ground floor is interactive with a fully glazed storefront suitable for cafes and restaurants. An entrance lobby connects with the upper levels as well as the central courtyard. A small green patch between the property line and the storefront creates a buffer, introducing vegetation and contrast against the brick facade.&nbsp;
The residential block at the rear of the site has three apartments on each floor: two 1BHK and one 3BHK apartment. Each apartment is planned to receive some natural light during the daytime. Common circulation staircases and lobbies connect all the apartments. The 1BHK apartments are planned linearly from north to south, facing east and southwest so that each apartment faces the open street. The 3BHK apartments face west so that the bedroom faces south, and the interior spaces utilize light well and western setback for light and ventilation. A multi-use hall is provided on the rooftop accessible from the residential side.
Green spaces are provided wherever possible, in the setbacks, within the courtyard, and with planters on the balcony/terrace.

Brick Exposure

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ManavSewa Ashram provides domestic and institutional care and services to people across Nepal who have been deprived of social inclusion, facing mental health conditions and societal challenges, whether in rural or urban contexts, isolated by their families for mental health conditions, victims of social crime, or simply in need of help and care. This is all made possible through the collective efforts of volunteers, people with good faith, community and government support, and a group of dedicated officials of the Ashram. Simply put, it is a place to call home for all those in need. Overlooking the Lamjung mountain range and surrounding hilly landscape, the site lies on a scenic trail from Besisahar to Ghalegaun in Lamjung. The facility is planned to accommodate 100 residents with a male-female-child ratio of 40-40-20, along with Jestha Nagarik Manomanjan Kendra, an elderly care facility for 50 senior citizens with well-facilitated living and medical services.
Rammed earth technology has been used, inspired by vernacular aesthetics and material usage, creating an environment that promotes sustainable practices and a healthy lifestyle within the establishment. Locally sourced building materials and resources have been utilized from the initiation to the operation of the facility for better sustainability in the energy and resource management. Multiple interactions with local communities have taken place since the initiation of the project, focusing on the subject of vernacular ideas and ways of living in such hilly settlements, to better understand the human values, connection with the natural surroundings, and identity of the place. Among those interactions were also those with stakeholders and officials under the supervision and collaboration of experts in related fields of natural building practices and engineering to introduce better building solutions while promoting new ways of designing and using locally available building materials and resources.
Both the facilities are segmented mid-section through the site, with the Ashram planned to the north side and the elderly care facility towards the south while sharing common facilities such as the kitchen, medical and physiotherapy services, and some of the pocket open spaces. The overall planning is inspired by the settlement pattern and its planning in a stepped hilly terrain and vernacular aesthetics, in which the color and material of the buildings and surroundings blend with the warm and grey tones of the landscape. The functions have been categorized according to the privacy of respective areas via stepped planning on the terrain, with administrative, immediate medical and isolation care units on the lowermost levels, while the upper levels are occupied with residential, multi-use areas, and pockets of open space. The design takes advantage of smaller open land to imitate the narrow connectivity and flow of different spaces, as one would find in a typical traditional settlement of the hilly area. The elderly care facility is more interactive with the public as it requires less surveillance compared to the controlled environment of the Ashram and comprises a community hall for communal gatherings and events, provision of sleeping quarters, meditation and multi-use pavilions, along with a community library where one can come and learn about the local culture and landscape. The planning and management of the establishment allow such a cooperative relationship between Ashram and elderly care, creating a shared atmosphere.
Amidst the slowly degrading trend of architecture and practice in the hilly region of Nepal, this design sets an example in modern-day architectural practice to follow in the coming future in the Lamjung region. Ultimately, it will contribute to the larger community. This healthcare establishment also has the potential to become a communal and touristic heritage site, preserving the very vernacular characteristics of the Lamjung region with the introduction of natural building practices in the form of rammed earth. The design aims to create opportunities and share skilled resources with the surrounding communities to promote the concept of natural building practices and healthier habitable spaces in the present-day context of the hilly landscape of Nepal.

ManavSewa Ashram

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Bal Bikas Kendra

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Beautiful things are best when they are brief. The very notion best put together to brief transience of life. For the living, to be able to help the deceased pass on is a great act of salvation. Gaatha got the opportunity to design and propose such space in the form of a facility in the foothills of Swayambhunath Stupa, a UNESCO-listed World Heritage Site. The location already is a fully operating cremation ground for specific cultural groups of Tamang and Gurung people where the process takes place in a traditional manner of burning with firewood in semi-open pavilions. At around the phase of the global pandemic COVID-19, there came a need for such a facility. Also, an electrically operated system creates lesser carbon emission and takes less time allowing efficiency in the process.
The ritualistic practices, in the modern day, have lost their essence in some sort due to convenience and accessibility such that the process of carrying the body to the cremation platform, supposed to be a final rite and journey to be carried out by both the living and the deceased, is now performed to a very near reach by a vehicular medium. Along with this, the families and close ones related to the deceased who come there in a time of grief and contemplation, do not get to contemplate the event due to unmanaged public spaces and circulations, ultimately causing chaos around. To address the situation, the design is inspired by the Buddhist concept of gardens within the landscape as a medium to become a threshold of transient beings. Coherently sequenced as three gardens, Udhyana (उद्यान), namely, Prasthan (प्रस्थान) Udhyana; arrival for one, departure for the other, Bodhi (बोधि) Udhyana; contemplative spaces and Shokh (शोक) Udhyana; grieving and departure, the journey for both the living and the deceased is well-organized taking in reference all the necessary spaces and elements to be incorporated in the planning after having multiple interactions with locals and practicing priests/lama on the right way of conducting the very ritual.
The very idea of life form is an energy and the elements of nature being the whole of all existence, the crematorium is embraced by a planned fabricated landscape with selective native vegetation, symbolizing the impermanence, from the entrance to the cremation hall which includes open as well as semi-open spaces for one to be in the moment of grief, all including ample green areas to aid the spatial experience. Also, the majority of the built structure is made of rammed earthen walls on the surface level providing warmth in a shelter while the facility also includes a cornea-donation service and provision of mortuary located underground. Necessary facilities of administration and in-house management with sanitary rooms are designed along with necessary technical rooms needed for the electrically operated system within the underground and surface level creating no disturbance in primary activities.
The interplay of light in the building and open spaces along with the critically analyzed nature of each space to have a respective ambiance, the design takes on a minimal approach in creating a series of connected sacred and contemplative spaces. While providing comfort and accessibility, there has been no compromise in making a place where events would require to be rightfully following and fulfilling all rituals. For the public mass right outside the crematorium, where pedestrian movement occurs in abundance from early morning, it appears like a few floating slabs amidst the park as seen from the road level, creating a safe and undisturbed architectural experience in and out.

Udhyana

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Gaatha is the local partner for this project which is being done in collaboration with a New York-based design firm Sharon Davis Design (SDD) and Nepal-based design and construction firm Sustainable Future Nepal (SFN) where SDD created the main conceptual design of the buildings and landscape and SFN did the technical design and construction. It is home to Manav Sewa Ashram, a service and care refuge for people facing homelessness due to mental health conditions and different societal challenges in Nepal. The project is divided into two facilities; a residential care home and a learning center open to non-residents with a capacity of 200 people, and 100 people respectively.&nbsp;
The facility is constructed using locally sourced earth and stones in rammed earth construction technology. Rammed earth buildings are environmentally sustainable and substantially reduce the energy consumption for active heating and cooling.

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ManavSewa Ashram provides domestic and institutional services to people throughout Nepal who have been deprived of social inclusion, facing mental health conditions and societal challenges in both rural and urban contexts and are isolated by their families due to mental health conditions, victims of social crime, or in need of help and care. These services are provided through the collective efforts of volunteers, people with good faith, community and government support, and a group of dedicated officials of the Ashram. Simply put, it is a place to call home for all those in need. The Ashram is situated on the outskirts of the core Biratanagar urban area, amidst large farm fields and local settlements of Bargachhi. The land is comparatively compact and segmented by a park designed for the Ashram, with the facility designed to accommodate 200 residents, including volunteers and caretakers.
Inspired by the vernacular characteristics of courtyard planning in Rana Tharu settlements, the design incorporates multiple blocks around common central open spaces and visually open corridors that provide safe and monitored access to the open space for all the residents of the Ashram. Such pockets of green spaces are connected with semi-open connections for visual linkage as well as proper airflow throughout the circulating areas within the building blocks. Most activity areas, including dining, kitchen, administration, and multi-function spaces, have been planned around the ground level for ease of activity management and surveillance. The built volume has blocks planned in a progressive manner, from front to rear, to minimize psychological intimidation and the grandeur of the building for new residents and visitors, creating a balance between the built and open space of the park within the facility. Within this interconnected volume, privacy and circulation, along with residential areas for in-house staff, male and female residents, and children, have been carefully planned, with isolation care units and provision of medical rooms planned within the ground level. The children's care facility comprises an open study and learning area with access to an open terrace overlooking the landscape to the east, as well as the central courtyard. As the children need a presence of an elder group to constantly take care of them, the staff's residential area lies adjacent to their facility on the same floor. The presence of courtyards and clear corridors allows every space within the structure to have a well-ventilated and naturally daylight atmosphere throughout the day.
The Ashram has a park named Kabir-Vatika, after a notable figure. It is an explorative landscape with varieties of native vegetation and water bodies, contributing to the micro-climate of the place to a certain extent. The park is accessible to the public as well as the residents of the Ashram, ensuring a safe and friendly environment for everyone. The facility has been planned with a bio-gas plant and a rainwater harvesting system for better sustainability of resources in the longer run.
The design incorporates exposed brickwork throughout the volume, with brick dust, commonly Surkhi, mixed with lime as plaster for external application on exposed brick wall surfaces. This represents the warmth of Tharu settlements of the region, while also capturing the local craft skills of Tharu culture on floral and characteristic motifs as an aesthetic as well as cultural representation of local communities. The residential neighborhood of the Rana Tharu community belonging to that place has a welcoming character and social threshold, with a space that allows interaction and pause designed in their entrance to a private household. This identifying characteristic has been translated in the design, with the entrance gate and reception block not just being a property barrier but also a welcoming threshold for Ashram and surrounding green farm fields.

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ManavSewa Ashram provides domestic and institutional care and services to people across Nepal who have been deprived of social inclusion, facing mental health conditions and societal challenges, whether in rural or urban contexts, isolated by their families for mental health conditions, victims of social crime, or simply in need of help and care. This is all made possible through the collective efforts of volunteers, people with good faith, community and government support, and a group of dedicated officials of the Ashram. Simply put, it is a place to call home for all those in need. Amist the farmland surrounding the industrial city of Birgunj, the site lies in the great plains of terai region. The facility is planned to accommodate 100 residents with a male-female ratio of 50-50, along with Humanity Learning center, a residencial training center for 50 people.
Rammed earth technology has been used, inspired by vernacular aesthetics and material usage, creating an environment that promotes sustainable practices and a healthy lifestyle within the establishment. Locally sourced building materials and resources have been utilized from the initiation to the operation of the facility for better sustainability in the energy and resource management. Multiple interactions with local communities have taken place since the initiation of the project, focusing on the subject of vernacular ideas and ways of living in such settlements of terai, to better understand the human values, connection with the natural surroundings, and identity of the place. Among those interactions were also those with stakeholders and officials under the supervision and collaboration of experts in related fields of natural building practices and engineering to introduce better building solutions while promoting new ways of designing and using locally available building materials and resources.
The facilities are planned in such a way that the two can exist seperately or in coherence as per requirement. Sharing the common areas like parking, hall and entry pavilions, both the facilities are designed to be administered by the Ashram team. Considering the hot and humid climate, the traditional courtyard planning has been opted with buffer corridors that further protect the indoors from the harsh summer sun.
Amidst the slowly degrading trend of architecture and practice in the terai region of Nepal, this design sets an example in modern-day architectural practice to follow in the coming future in the Birgunj region. Ultimately, it will contribute to the larger community. The design aims to create opportunities and share skilled resources with the surrounding communities to promote the concept of natural building practices and healthier habitable spaces in the present-day context of the terai landscape of Nepal.

Manavsewa Ashram

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ManavSewa Ashram provides domestic care and institutional services to people all over Nepal who have been deprived of social inclusion, and facing mental health conditions and societal challenges, whether in rural or urban contexts. The Ashram also assists those who have been isolated by their families due to mental health conditions, victims of social crime, and those who need help and care. All of these services are provided through the collective efforts of volunteers, people with good faith, community and government support, and a group of dedicated Ashram officials. In short, it is a place for those in need to call home. The facility is located in the village of Gramthan in Biratnagar and is surrounded by vast open farm fields and local Tharu settlements. The secluded, safe, and humble community makes the location ideal for providing care and services to a planned occupancy of 150 individuals, along with caretakers and volunteers. A local stream flows through the site and has guided the design principles in terms of planning and flow of spaces.
Multiple community interactions on topics such as locally available materials, generational skills and knowledge of using locally available building materials and construction techniques, bamboo and timber crafts, local vegetation and bio-diversity, socio-cultural identity, and the vernacular essence of the place have led to program and design discussions with Ashram officials and local personnel on site. Observations of traditional Tharu settlements in the region and the corresponding lifestyle of that specific Terai region of Nepal have also informed these discussions. This collaborative process has resulted in site and land management ideas on flood management, privacy, and functional planning of proposed programs based on external site factors. The design incorporates the abundant use of bamboo and locally sourced timber, along with earth and thatch, as primary building materials. The design also incorporates the identity of the region through the use of the rammed earth construction method. Utilization of these resources from the initiation to the operation of the facility provides better sustainability in energy and resource management.
Functionally, administrative areas and public spaces with harvest gardens are planned for the northernmost stretch of the site, where the main entrance to the facility is also located. Common services such as dining, kitchen, multi-use spaces, and open areas for Ashram residents have been planned centrally to improve surveillance and circulation. A community hall for events and interaction, a souvenir shop with products made by the Ashram residents with love, and management facilities, along with a private residential block for in-house staff, have been planned for the northern part to segregate the private areas from the public areas. Residential and care facilities are limited to the south side, with a well-separated environment for male and female residents. The isolation care unit is planned near the security post for surveillance. Pockets of coherent open spaces with clear visual perspectives of the outer fields and internal surroundings have been planned for the residential area. Elderly residents have their rooms near the central pavilion for ease of access, while the entire residential area has its own privacy and accessibility. Physically challenged residents need not reach upper levels and have free-flowing access to the landscape. The central pavilion is designed in an elliptical structure that looks both inwards to the courtyard, allowing activity and natural air circulation throughout, and outward to the fields, giving a sense of vast green open space around the major activity area. These types of care facilities should be well thought out, not just in terms of functional requirements and planning, but also in terms of how they interact with people from a visual perspective. The design has a humble take on the local vernacular style of sloped roofs and the use of earth, thatch, timber, and bamboo, making the place familiar for new residents and less stressful on how their environment looks, ultimately giving them a sense of being at home.
Serving the community's needs of promoting local crafts, materials, and technology with a common space for exchange and interaction, the project also reaches out to the exterior surroundings in the form of a community hub, souvenir station, and an organic harvest farm. The project, thus, provides opportunities and events for sharing skilled resources with the communities around and promoting the concept of natural building practices and healthier habitable spaces in the harsh climatic conditions of the Terai region of Nepal. The facility also has an establishment adjacent to it proposed as Senior Citizen's Village, which has a provision of care services to facilitate the Ashram occasionally. The elderly there would have the opportunity to provide services and care to the Ashram in their respective ways. Also, the interactions helped in collecting knowledge from the locals regarding native vegetation species and ways to create a self-sustaining biodiversity that would also contribute to the microclimate of the place.

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Riverbanks hold great significance in the growth of any civilization, carrying deep social, cultural, and religious values, particularly in Hindu society. The project is situated on the Singhiya riverbank in Biratnagar, where there already exists a temple complex comprising several Hindu deities' temples. The complex currently serves both as a place of worship and a social space for visitors, especially during morning and evening hours. In such a context, redeveloping the complex into a much more diverse and interactive landscape that continues to the riverbank would allow people of all ages and cultures to experience a socio-cultural space regardless of their religious beliefs. They can be part of practicing the ancient Hindu culture of Aarati in the evening on the riverbanks, spend time in a calm and meditative environment, or just sit and watch the world go by.
The complex segments outward to the riverbank with planned walkways and pavilions organized throughout the landscape, extending to a series of stepped platforms all the way to the river, serving the function of observation during the evening prayer ritual, Aarati. Open seating arrangements offer multiple privacy buffers at any time of the day, and the steps allow connection to the river, which is intensively used by women on the occasion of Chhath-Parwa, a Hindu festival. Over the course of multiple interactions and observations of the location, many tangible and intangible aspects of the place inspired the process of design and development. One crucial observation that influenced the design was a coherent resemblance of colonnades found in the structure of a Hindu temple and pavilion with the arrangement of trees in a forest, creating a diverse yet unified experience within the same landscape. This idea was followed up by documenting stories, historical events, and significant illustrations representing the context of the place with rich cultural and religious notions, all within wooden posts used in the pavilions. In the current times, one can hardly get to know or observe such heritage in modern architecture.
The Terai region of Nepal is vibrant with colors, which lend a unique identity to various aspects of the community, including food, fashion, and cultural demonstrations. During earlier times, it was a common practice to collect water for multiple purposes in huge clay pots from the rivers. However, such practices are hardly seen today, which directly relates to the pollution of natural water sources. To pay homage to the identities of the place, the landscape includes a Kund, a stepped water collection pit, with clay pots depicting local crafts arranged around the walkways and pavilions. Thoughtfully planned architectural lighting makes the complex lively during the evening event of Aarati and creates a safe and comfortable space for everyone. The major structures are safely setback from the bloodline of the region in case of monsoon flooding, which remains quite common in this region. Almost all the previously inaccessible open spaces are now a part of a larger complex, fully accessible and consisting of native vegetation species planned in abundance to provide a more habitable public space within the temple complex. The landscape also offers flexible spaces for various cultural events, festivals, gatherings, and other authorized events at different times, making it a place for everyone.
The project aims to captivate the governing authorities and the general public regarding public space management and the cleanliness of natural water sources. It reaches out to the larger community of the place in an impactful way.

Aarati

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Initially, the landscape was established as a pond for irrigation purposes, which had a self-regenerating water source. It progressively developed with the addition of a Shivalinga statue at the center of the pond, with unpaved circulation walkways all around it. This area has been used both as a religious worshipping place and as a social space for ManavSewa Ashram and the surrounding communities.
The concept of the landscape has evolved from the initial days of development to the establishment of ManavSewa Ashram. It has now become a landscape that provides a meditative environment rooted in natural biodiversity, with spaces for rejuvenation, knowledge exchange, ideas, and healthier lifestyle adaptation, all around the pond. This progressive ripple around the pond has been the core concept of the project's design and planning. The landscape is distributed all around the pond in specified zones. The eastern perimeter has a dense vegetation of native species, with the landscape evoking calm and contemplative walkways, accompanied by semi-open pavilions, a multi-purpose open-air theater, resting spots, and a multi-use meditation hall. The western perimeter comprises semi-open pavilions, a souvenir and story gallery relating to ManavSewa Ashram, a mini-scale public library for all demographics, where one can learn and share knowledge on humanity, healthier and holistic living, ethnic culture, biodiversity, and much more. There is also a vegan cafeteria for the public to visit the park, and a public restroom for the park, which complies with universal design standards, providing safe and comfortable toilets and other sanitary facilities for all individuals. The central part of the pond has been designed to have a Jaldhara sculpture, accompanying the pre-existing Shivalinga, which is accessible by the bridges on either side.
Natural building practices have been incorporated into the design through the use of rammed earth, as Hetauda, the project location, has an abundance of good quality building materials like stone and earth, which have been primarily used. This promotes sustainable, natural building practices and is the first of its kind in the Hetauda region, which will ultimately attract the public and raise awareness about natural building solutions in Nepal.
The landscape offers a variety of experiences, ranging from learning about native species to attending open-air free speech and interactive workshops on various subjects, to simply taking a break and enjoying the natural setting, far from the city center. Visitors can learn about the stories of ManavSewa Ashram and experience a dynamic landscape offering both joyful and meditative atmospheres, all around the static composure of water. At the end of their visit, they will feel rejuvenated and content, rather than tired.