LAURIE BAKER

THE HAMLET- RESIDENCE OF LAURIE BAKER

QUESTIONS
• HOW DID LAURIE BAKER SETTLE IN INDIA ?
• WHY IS LAURIE BAKER KNOWN AS ‘THE GANDHI OF ARCHITECTURE’?
• WHAT WERE THE DIFFERENT YET SIMPLE CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES
USED BY LAURIE BAKER THAT IS STILL BEING USED?
LAURENCE WILFRED
LAURIE BAKER
(2 MARCH 1917 – 1 APRIL 2007)
• BRITISH BORN INDIAN ARCHITECT
• KNOWN FOR INITIATIVES IN :
COST EFFECTIVE ENERGY EFFICIENT ARCHITECTURE
DESIGNS THAT MAXIMIZE SPACE, VENTILATION & LIGHT
COST EFFECTIVE ENERGY EFFICIENT ARCHITECTURE
• INFLUENCED BY MAHATMA GANDHI AND USING MANY
OF HIS IDEALOLOGIES , HE’S CALLED THE “GANDHI OF
ARCHITECTURE”
• AWARDS: Padma Shri, MBE
• SPOUSE:ELIZABETH BAKER
• CHILDREN: TILAK, VIDYA AND HEIDI
 EARLY LIFE
• Born into a staunch Methodist family, the youngest son
of Birmingham Gas Department's chief accountant,
Charles Frederick Baker and Millie Baker.
• Early schooling at King Edwards Grammar School.
• Elder brothers, Leonard and Norman studied law, and
sister, Edna who was the oldest of them all.
• In his teens Baker began to question what religion
meant to him and decided to become a Quaker since
it was closer to what he believed in.
• Baker studied architecture at Birmingham Institute of
Art and Design Birmingham, and graduated in 1937,
aged 20, in a period of political unrest in Europe
*Quaker- religious society devoted to peaceful ideals.
 AFTER STUDIES
During the Second World War, he served in the Friends Ambulance Unit. After a short spell on the south coast of
England and mostly looking after naval casualties he was sent to China as a trained anesthetist with a surgical
team, mainly to cope with civilian casualties in the war between China and Japan.
However, after a year or two of this war area activity, he found himself having to deal with civilians suffering from
leprosy. He was seconded to a hospital formerly run by an order of German sisters who were all interned by the
Chinese as enemy aliens.
Baker had to spend three months in Bombay waiting for his boat. During this time he stayed with a Quaker
friend, who also happened to be a good friend of the Mahatma. Baker attended many of Gandhiji's talks and
prayer-meetings — which eventually led to a more-than-casual friendship between them.
This was also the time of the Gandhi-Jinnah talks and the height of the 'Quit India' movement. So though he felt
the need to return to India, to settle and work here, Baker was initially discouraged by the nationwide animosity to
the Raj and to all Westerners. But the Mahatma reassured him that though the Raj must quit, concerned individuals
would always find a welcome place to work with Indians.
 TIME WITH GANDHIJI
After hearing Gandhiji’s talks Baker felt the need to return to India and work there, but was initially discouraged by the
nationwide animosity to the Raj and to all Westerners. But the Mahatma reassured him that though the Raj must quit,
concerned individuals would always find a welcome place to work with Indians. In fact, Gandhiji showed great interest in
the leprosy work in China, and the lives of the ordinary people there.
"It was also from the influence of Mahatma Gandhi I learnt that the real people you should be building for, and who are in
need, are the 'ordinary' people — those living in villages and in the congested areas of our cities." Gandhi's idea was that it
should be possible to build a home with materials found within a five-mile radius of a site. This was to have a great
influence in his later life.
His initial commitment to India in 1945 had him working as an architect for the World Leprosy Mission. The
organisation wanted a builder-architect-engineer. As new medicines for the treatment of the disease were becoming more
prevalent, Baker's responsibilities were focused on converting or replacing asylums once used to house the lepers into
treatment hospitals.
 INDIA
Baker found the missionary lifestyle - ostentatious bungalows,
socialite gatherings, too luxurious and instead decided to stay with the
Indian doctor P.J. Chandy and his family. The sister of his host,
Elizabeth Jacob (Baker called her "Kuni"), worked as a doctor in
Hyderabad with the same leprosy organisation.
The two met when Elizabeth came to Faizabad to perform an
operation on her brother and to take care of the hospital duties. Baker
and Jacob found themselves sharing common beliefs and decided to
marry. However, as there was considerable resistance from both their
families, they decided to wait. Work and travel allowed them only
brief periods together, and they finally got married in 1948.
 ARCHITECTURE
• Designing and building low cost , high quality, beautiful
homes.
• Suited to or built for lower middle to lower class clients.
• Irregular , pyramid-like structures on roofs, with one side
open and tilting into the wind.
• Brick jail walls, a perforated brick screen which utilizes
natural air movement to cool the home's interior and create
intricate patterns of light and shadow.
• His respect for nature made sure that he never really made
designs in which trees were uprooted or cut down.
• This saves construction cost as well, since working around
difficult site conditions is much more cost- effective than clear
cutting.
 THE HAMLET
• This is Baker’s home in Trivandrum
• This is a remarkable and unique house built
on a plot of land along the slope of a rocky
hill, with limited access to water
• However Baker’s genius has created a
wonderful home for his family
• Material used from unconventional sources
• Family eats in kitchen
• Electricity wiring is not concealed
SITE SELECTION
DRAWINGS
LIVING ROOM
ARCHITECTURAL FEATURES
• Steps directly cut in rocks
• Small sitting at entrance for guests
• Wall decorated with broken pottery, pens, glass
• Use of natural light
• Never cut trees
• Inner courtyard-close to nature
• Arches led into a beautiful open room
• Courtyard has many gardens and ponds
• Pitched roof made of Mangalore tiles
• Bakers fondness of arches
DETAILS
 OTHER FEATURES
• A traditional Kerala window

• Typical traditional tiling used in south

India mostly in areas where it is
sloped

• Simple windows made from waste wooden

planks and grills made of thrown away metal pieces
USE OF NATURAL LIGHT
CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES
 DEATH AND LEGACY
• The low cost mud homes he designed for the poor followed what was known as the “baker
model” and had been replicated in their tens of thousands throughout the state.
• Baker became an Indian citizen in 1988, two years later he was given one of India's highest
civilian honor's, the Padma Sree.
• He also won the united nations habitat award in 1992 and the international union of architects
award the following year.
• He continued working past the age of 85, and owned only the family home he designed in
Trivandrum.
• He passed away on April 1st 2007 at 7:30am.
THANK YOU