Critical Regionalism: An Architectural Identity of cityhalls in Bhutan

Abstract

Bhutan’s transformation to a democratic nation took place about a decade ago while urban governance started much earlier, in the 1990s. Our towns and cities are in the journey of experiencing devolved power and public participation. In this continuous phase of evolving and adapting, Architecture plays an important role in constructing resilient environments. cityhalls are essentially one of the core symbols of democracy, reverberating the community’s culture, values and civic pride. However, there has been no architectural identity for townhalls in Bhutan in the last 20 years of urban governance. With this prominent constraint, there are plausible risks concerning the precious architecture of Bhutan and also, in meeting the global standards of urban governance. Moreover, the design of a “Bhutanese cityhall” is likely to encounter struggles in finding a unique ground and identity amongst the homogeneity of today’s world. The concept of Critical Regionalism has been conceived in the 1980s, as a standard tool to critique universal modernism in terms of values which are locally cultured. This study uses critical regionalism to strategize design concepts to define the Bhutanese language for cityhalls, where it explores the relationship between Architecture and environment, culture and modern technology. The program for the cityhall design is devised from popular literatures, case studies and international design standards. These strategies are applied in the design of a proposed cityhall for Thimphu, as a final year architectural thesis. The design deconstructs universal trends into local values while defining cityhalls as being more than just institutional buildings. With its foundations on Critical Regionalism, Thimphu cityhall will set the pioneering example for other cityhalls in Bhutan, re[1]grounding architecture however without stipulating a singular conventional strategy