BOOKS & EVENTS
AMAZING TIMBER RESORTS BY ARCHITECT N MAHESH
It was a relaxed weekend catch-up with Ar. N Mahesh and the conversation veered towards reviewing the body of his works. A close study of the entire portfolio revealed that the hospitality projects had a story to tell about how each one was different yet bound by a common thread – that of love for timber. And there began the trail to document each and every detail of the shortlisted 13 projects spread all over Kerala, in Rajasthan and a resort renovated by Mahesh in Kenya.
An integral part of the book was to showcase the tradition of building with timber as Kerala’s heritage. Visiting various sites of historical timber architecture I could draw parallels in his works and get a visual context to relate the resort designs to. What also added hugely was the fact that we had two of the best photographers of the country on board, Balan Madhavan and Amit Pasricha. Foreword by Shashi Tharoor and Epilogue by the now-late Capt CP Krishnan Nair of The Leela; finally culminated in the ready-for-press tome.
It was a totally immersive 10-month journey, and as I leaf through the pages, I’m still in awe of the fact that we moved from a sketch on Mahesh’s ‘signature yellow note-pad’ at the impromptu meeting to the first release on 13th Nov 2013 by Shashi Tharoor followed by functions in Trivandrum and Chennai within the year! For me it remains one of my most cherished phases of work-life.
IGNITE YOUR CREATIVITY BY PROF. MIKE KNOWLES AND MRIDULA SHARMA
This book is a series of short stories, poems and self-help activities aimed at middle school students as a supplement course book to keep the spark of creativity alive and to inculcate design as a problem-solving mechanism in a child’s psyche.
A NASA report showed that at the age of five, a child’s creativity levels are 98%. In time the uniformity of the education system, and the outcome expectations destroy it gradually. A child of 12 has a creativity level of 30% and it gets worse. At the age of 16, when futures are planned, the level drops to a staggering 12%. The average adult has a resource of 2% creativity!
Passionate about furtherance of design in everyday life, Mridula has always spoken about the delayed introduction of design as a subject in our education system. This book is the culmination and meeting of minds of two forward thinking, proponents of design in all spheres of life. Mridula has worked closely with Prof. Mike Knowles as one of the early Fellow of Royal Society of the Arts in India and instituted the RSA Livingetc Awards for Young Designers from 2009-2012.
Based on the premise that all of us are born with creativity locked into us, and that it is the rigours of our education system that derails this latent power, the book is born out of a conviction that “a little consciousness of design could alleviate much of the angst in our daily lives”.
