My Motivation To Enter Post-Graduate Programme In Design And Architecture
As I walked the dusty roads of Dharavi, loaded with sheets, I observed a cramped ground of opportunities where willingness overshadows the deficiency of means. When my 18 year-old guide turned out to be a resident of the slum itself, I realised that our contrasting worlds, my comfort and his unrest, are not inconsistent in every respect. Similar to well-off, the community at Dharavi was loaded with infinite dreams but confined in shrinking streets and insecure rentals. The experience concluded with a lasting dilemma - how can I make design benefit both of the worlds? An outcome of the brief tour to Asia’s second largest slum in Mumbai was a realisation that a dearth of resources should not deny anyone the involvement with the spaces they own. In all aspects, design is a language that is interdependent of riches and should be fostered as much in Dharavi as in Notting Hill.
Seeking inspiration from Hassan Fathy, an Egyptian architect who devoted his life to improve the built environment in poor countries, I decided to observe the possible ideas for establishing a social responsibility as designers. Hence, I undertook this issue as the essence of my research paper in my final year, which set out to create a movement for socially conscious architecture by exploring the role of architects in addressing the emergence of informal settlements. There’s no denying that an urge to sketch my ideas has been in existence since the genesis of my learning. When a crowd of options emerged after I completed my schooling with distinction, I was fascinated by the idea of pursuing architecture in my under graduation. As I slowly grew accustomed to the world of architecture and design, my interest grew manifold.
The curriculum at my highly reputed undergraduate college, Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, equipped me with the understanding of spatial design, material diversification, built environment and construction techniques. I also engaged myself in courses like theory of architecture, which steered in me an inclination towards the writing discipline. After critiquing the works of renowned architects and completing my dissertation during academic years, I later went on to create content for my blog, named cryptic twenties, which deals with the ordinary issues of the twenties. After five years of completely immersing myself in the sphere of creating spaces and structures, I was, rightfully, guided towards my interest - design and was motivated to study it further in my post-graduation.
My first encounter with design happened through lines, in the first year of graduation. The brief of a certain project called for generation of spaces by exploring varied types of lines and thereafter, extruding them to create three dimensional planes. What intrigued me the most was the nuances of spaces that resulted from the alteration of proportions of the planes. This particular experiment revealed a distinct facet of design - it is limitless. In later years, I used this characteristic, coupled with technical knowledge, to resolve design problems. Be it revitalising a district centre which fell into a state of despair or conceptualising a school that allows student participation in development of the building or experimenting with a zero-waste garment solution, all of these projects called for analytical problem-solving and solution-finding that led to optimum products, hence, answering my dilemma with a likelihood for design to make an impact. With a preference in ideations of design, I have constantly worked on my concept and idea development. I acquired learnings from my guides and mentors, adhering to a wider comprehension of design. This was additionally explored in my nine months internship with Studio Lotus, an architecture-interior design studio based out of Delhi, India, where I got the opportunity to be involved in conceptual stages of designing of a community centre on a challenging contoured land. The project had to display strong imageability and the evolved result was an iconic curved form with magnificent views and extra stability, feeding the site and climatic conditions. While working on the project, I realised the value of team work and importance of co-ordination required for smooth sailing of work. The internship offered me a chance to learn the technicalities of a project whilst allowing me to gain perspective to think like a designer and curate visual ideas.
After graduating first class with honours and building a strong academic background in design, I began working at Chromed Design Studio, New Delhi, to further hone my design skills via research and brain-storming sessions. I not only assisted the principal architect, Mr. Abhigyan Neogi, directly on a variety of projects but also took an initiative to lead specific projects on my own. While working on different stages of design process, I started refining my research, presentation and communication skills. I acquired a taste of project management and client handling besides overseeing the on-site execution. Within a short span of time, I supervised an intern and dutifully guided her throughout her internship. The experience of managing projects from start to finish made me recognise the significance of time management and to balance the finances alongside. The position allowed me to focus on integrating research with ethical, responsible and entrepreneurial practices and offered me a sense of real time experience of design and its implementation.
Besides my experience in design, I have volunteered at Teach for India, a non-profit organisation educating the underprivileged children, which assisted in my interests. While, as designers, it is important to create ideas through upgradation of technology for the ease of the society, it is equally necessary to fulfil the rudimentary needs of the needful for the betterment of the society. By implementing design in their lives, via effective interventions and economical products, will, undoubtedly, make design matter. My ultimate goal is to introduce these facets of design to people who are unknown to the beauty of design world. I am seeking to establish this goal by exploring, researching and experimenting with design ideas that incorporates the creativity of an architect's eyes, sensibility of an engineer’s mind and emotions of an artist’s hands. Throughout these years, I have accumulated a wide grasp on design perception and have acquired the knowledge of management and advancing technology. But as I mentioned earlier, design is limitless. Since learning is a perpetual process, my main aim is to absorb as much as I can and hence, I have wish to enroll myself in XXX, a course which will justly direct my abilities to fabricate ideas with technical and management skills.
My experiences have aptly and extensively prepared me to pursue a Graduate degree at XXX University. It is certainly the excellent choice for pursuing my higher studies because its inspiring faculty and diverse research areas for experimentation would suitably assist me in my career growth. Being a part of one of the most prestigious education systems worldwide would result in me being able to tap into the vast network of resources associated via seminars, versatile cohort of professionals and diverse student body. Since I envision a research work with rooted experimentation on all tangible and intangible factors of design by incorporating the analytical thinking to provide responsive solutions to the end-user along with adopting the social responsibility as a designer, I think this particular program from your university is appropriate for steering me to my goals while refining my work to the minutest elementary details of vision and symbolism.
I strongly believe that the Post-Graduate Programme at your esteemed institution will eminently contribute to my intellect and will be a perfect blend of knowledge and specialisation acquirement for me. With dedication and grit, I will try my best to maintain the high academic standards that your institute is synonymous with. With my plans to excel academically and involve myself in social activities including voluntary work, I look forward to the future gains I shall be reaping, if given an opportunity to pursue the XXX at your esteemed university. Thank you in advance for your time and consideration.
