DESCRIPTION:
Located within the Mahindra World City Industrial Development outside Chennai, the site for the proposed factory development measures approximately 3 acres in area. Being the very last site in the sector, it faces a small open space reservation and a large landscaped green belt belonging to the Mahindra Research Valley to the south.
This large green space to the south of the site became the primary driver to the overall design direction. To compliment the southern green vista, the eastern edge of the site has been made free of much vehicular movement and landscaped with undulating mounds of local grass, bullrushes and rocks. This allowed the design to have two distinct landscape anchors, one to the east which is within the site and the other which is to the south at a distance.
Industrial architecture typically is purely driven by function and the various activities that constitute it are built as separate entities all laid out individually on the site. In this project, the endeavour was to amalgamate all activities and place them together under ‘one roof’. The result is the amalgamation of the office, service building, canteen, manufacturing area and stores along streets and courts, enveloped by a large metal roof structure whose structural members are painted bright red. The top roof brings in ample natural light to the internal spaces through polycarbonate light-strip panels, allowing the internal spaces to be completely naturally lit and glare free during daytime hours. The walls which are corrugated metal sheets along the north and west become ceramic-fritted glazed panels, that further reduce glare, towards the south and east allowing the interior space to flow outwards into the landscape.
In terms of spatial organization, the requirement of a display room, an office space, manufacturing area, stores, services, and canteen were organized in a grid of streets punctuated with courts and landscaped tree planters. The spaces are modulated across two levels giving good visibility from one end of the development to the other, which traditionally in factories gets compartmentalized and segregated.
The open manufacturing area which forms the central space of the overall factory layout, is air conditioned to maintain low relative humidity and a pleasant temperate of around 29 degrees Celsius. As the roof volume is large and uncontained, this space is cooled using an underfloor trench cooling system allowing the physics of convection to retain the cold air at the lower level while the top warm air exhausts through a ridge vent.
The overall structure with its central free-standing crane supports, cable trays, ducted exhausts and exposed services give the large open space a clean and uncluttered feel. The views from these spaces towards the glazed office spaces, internal tree courts and external landscaped areas gives the staff a connect with the outside which is rarely seen in factory production areas. These simple design decisions have greatly changed the mindset of the staff working within the factory and has had a profound impact on the overall morale and work culture of the team.
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