Remembering the Home

I have to spend my childhood experience in two very different houses. One is in the capital city of the Maldives which is Male’. This place is very compact due to the population, more than half of the total population of Maldives lives in the capital (Male’).that is around 170,000 people and the city is around 2 km longer. Now u can imagine how much the place is congested. The roads are full of vehicles and you will see construction all over the city. In the city you will see all buildings of different sizes none of them is bigger than 2000sq feet other than it is a government place. Usually for residence it is 1000sq feet. From far on the ocean this place is like a full concrete structure.

My house which I grew up in Male’ is a three story high building of 1200 sq feet but we live in two stories which are the ground floor and the first floor. Let’s start from the ground floor. This floor has a small shop which is facing the road and from a side of it there is a walk way to the apartment (2 room’s apartment) which is no more than 3 feet wide. From the walkway you will directly enter to the living area and you will see the kitchen in one side and the two rooms (one room is attached with a toilet) of the same size in one side. Each house has to share a party wall which is not wide more than 250mm so basically if u talks loud enough the people who live next house will hear clearly. There is almost no ventilation in the ground floor of any house in Male’ or a building. That’s why the government had a law for the architects, which is 10percent of the land should be open air. So that means 90 percent of the land can be built the other 10 percent is been untouched and this place is only for the ventilation process and for natural lighting.

I am studying architecture now and to be honest whenever I have to do a project in studio class to design a relaxation area, a one man hotel, a kindergarten school, the first thing I can think is about the ventilation of the place and natural lighting. After that it is not to use concrete I think that’s the reason behind why I love timber that much. In every project of mine you will see timber more than any other construction materials.