The cosmic General Assembly, Chandigarh, designed by Le Corbusier
On this last trip to India I took some time out to wander North, to Chandigarh, the Punjabi capital. It's a 50's modernist urban planning experiment commissioned by Nehru on the dawn of the partition, as a psychological replacement for Lahore, offered as the state capital to the displaced Hindus and Sikhs. My family were largely displaced from Lahore and the surrounding areas, and some of them ended up in Chandigarh.
An Indian garden city inspired by the Chicago school of urban planners, Chandigarh was conceived and executed by a number of Europeans and Americans, finally (and most famously) by Le Corbusier and his cousin Pierre, who, together with a number of Indian architects, worked on a completely integrated design solution for the modern Indian city, from bus stop to manhole design to theatres & cinemas, administrative buildings, residential blocks, commercial complexes and transport infrastructure. This is planning from scratch, on an overwhelming scale.
Top: The Secratariat façade, Middle: General Assembly detail, Bottom: Original tape showing the 'modulor' measurement scale
I was surprised to find Corb's writings to show a deep contemplation of proportion - he talks of building Chandigarh "in human proportions" and applies this to everything from road length to window dividers, tree height to about 10 different scales and qualities of housing. He used his own measurement scale ('modulor') based on the golden ratio, devised a set of traffic categorisation principles to be used in road layouts and oversaw the construction of an artificial lake and landscaped areas of the city. I've generally regarded Corb's inability to execute a usable, human architecture problematic but in this project he evidently injected a lot of useful ideas alongside his sheer intellectual energy. His cousin worked on Chandigarh until his death (long after Corb had returned to Europe) and is probably the unsung hero of the project.
Top: The city pavilion, Middle: Corb on Sukhna Lake, Bottom: Sukhna Lake today
I came away thinking of Chandigarh as a quiet triumph, in that it largely delivers and functions; utopian visions giving way to pleasant, usable spaces. The overriding aesthetic of unmaintained cubes of concrete is stunning, the landscaped areas put to good use by the residents, the traffic and housing density incredibly low by Indian standards, the noise pollution well contained. Astonishingly, much modern private residential housing in the city seems to have absorbed the modernist aesthetic (Corb's trademark strip windows are a particular favourite), as if the immersion in the lines, façades, materials & forms of the original architects has somehow overcome the place, gripping it despite the decades that have passed.
As you wander around, you are slowly overcome with a quiet sense of well-being that I can only attribute to a consistent design vision carried out on an unprecedented scale. If nothing else, it's an affirmation of the central role of design in all aspects of everyday life.
Top: Corbusier's 'Open Hand' logo for the city, Middle: High Court building, Bottom: A commercial block in the pedestrianised city center
There is consciously very little sensitivity to Indian tradition in the design of Chandigarh - Corb built a cosmic general assembly building that takes inspiration from Mughal endeavours past, but other than that, the city was from day one to be a "new city, unfettered by the traditions of the past" (Nehru). This place of 800K inhabitants, which was conceived on a completely empty plot of land in 1949, despite its grubby look and feel, still seems ahead of its time in today's smog-ridden, noise-polluted, poorly zoned urban India.
Interestingly, Chandigarh has been listed as a potential UNESCO World Heritage site, something which I imagine would have appalled Corbusier; a spirit ever in favour of creation over preservation.