‘ISHANYA’ is a utopian exposition center for building materials, sustainable technologies, and an interaction forum for multi-disciplinary design that transforms into a cultural complex at night. The exposition center is coupled with an integrated research development and consultancy cell that permits a dialogue between designers from the fields of Architecture, Engineering & the Fine Arts. The result: a living organism that comprises permanent display, new product launches and a continuous interaction between the major design disciplines.

The project also speaks of a hierarchy of spaces: the intimate human scale of the ‘street’, the intermediate scale of the courts and secondary spaces and the almost industrial scale of the tertiary spaces.

The design concept stems from the “MAIN STREET” or circulation “SPINE”, that ties together the myriad primary, secondary and tertiary spaces through an orchestrated array of courtyards, water channels and a stepped well or “KUND”. These elements are derived from an ancient vocabulary of the “WADA” architecture of Pune but are expressed as contemporary elements in exposed concrete, steel and glass.

Importantly the center transforms into a cultural complex in the evenings with an array of the performing arts that include an open air theater on the water, outdoor sculpture galleries and an indoor hall for music and cinema.