June
2024
Architect’s guide to less space more life
Dhaka is a very vibrant and a hard-core urban city. Today, the population of the city is more than that of New York and that's what makes Dhaka unique. I am a modernist and through my design practice, I try to unclutter the cluttered reality of our city. At Volumezero, we always try to give back to Dhaka in all our projects, while maintaining a constant dialogue with the surrounding fabric and the intangible forces at play. Consequently, the space optimization becomes the core of our design process, within the existing urban fabric, also a crucial tool that contributes in the cleanliness and openness in the city. But I do not see space optimization as a functional product, rather an absolute necessity. Our projects, Kafil Manor and House-10 are both situated at the centre of highly-sought-after residential neighbourhood of Gulshan. They are both multi-family residential buildings, and through space optimization, we were able to accommodate the needs of different users while ensuring lush green and open spaces with ample amount of natural light and natural ventilation, without compromising their privacy. Kafil Manor is a contemporary design that challenges the traditional approach to apartment design, while the design of House-10 is an example of “Form Follows Function”. Culturally in Bangladesh, we love to have large family gatherings in our homes every now and then. So, from an urban scale to much more personal scale, the need of space optimization can be felt. Adaptive furniture in our homes can act as great means of this optimization with no wastage of space. As mentioned before, I am a modernist and space optimization can also be seen as a modernist movement. It was BAUHAUS that taught generations of modernist architects and designers alike, that a furniture can be efficient in terms of materials and productions, ergonomically and spatially adaptive, and modern at the same time. You might have also noticed, that in our country, more and more modernist architects are emerging today, who are also inspired by these movements. ISHO has successfully come up with the same values which resonate with the architects and has become the perfect example of space optimization. In one of our conference rooms in our office, we use the Ergo Height Adjustable Table. The table is very much considerate of our posture and helps me and my colleagues in alternating between sitting and standing. Also, we have ISHO's Melrose Ottoman products in our workspaces, which are not only great for sitting but also help us organize our workspaces with their storage compartments insideThe video is available here: