Third Space | Studio Saar

Anglo-Indian architecture practice Studio Saar has completed a new learning and cultural centre in Udaipur, Rajasthan for Dharohar, a not-for-profit organisation working with schools and volunteers to provide extra-curricular activities in the area. Third Space: The Haveli of Creativity, Curiosity and Community is a learning and discovery centre for all ages, that offers world-class facilities for educational programmes, informal learning, socialising and performing arts.

Intended as a ‘third space’ – a place without boundaries beyond home or school, local children and people of all ages are encouraged to encounter and explore diverse, hands-on activities to better understand more about the world and their place within it. The new centre can host up to 2,000 visitors a day, offering a broad range of activities and workshops, providing much-needed resources to the people of Udaipur.

Third Space is designed to foster Dharohar’s key principles of openness, accessibility, and inclusivity, resulting in a free, unrestricted space which ignites curiosity, creativity and a sense of community for visitors, volunteers and staff. The new centre features a flexible entrance space for performances and community gatherings, a cinema, performing arts theatre, an interactive exhibition of science and technology, tinkering and maker spaces, workshopping and co-working spaces, a library, a café and retail space, and a lookout tower to take in surrounding views.

Third Space’s activities, programmes and curriculum are connected to 80 hectares of hills that are being rewilded as part of a reforestation project by Dharohar and Studio Saar. The ambitious project will see local flora and fauna returned to the area to increase biodiversity and the integration of both projects will provide further opportunities for learning, connecting the community with the local ecosystem that sustains it.

The building’s design draws inspiration from traditional havelis courtyard homes, featuring a central courtyard surrounded by a series of cloisters and shaded external circulation space. The facades feature intricate patterned Jali screens that provide ventilation while connecting the inside to the outside. Small, cantilevered niches in the façades, known as gokhra, act as wind catchers, playing a key role in the building’s passive cooling strategy and doubling as playful alcoves for reading, meeting and relaxing. A curved steel deck weaves around the courtyard and serves as a viewing platform allowing visitors to observe the programme of activities, climbing wall and performance area below. The structure is populated by native trees and planting at multiple levels, aiding with wayfinding, and bringing nature into the heart of the centre.

Cut-outs from the building’s local white marble screenwork and gokhra are used as floor tiles, creating a positive-negative relationship between facades and floors, while cut-outs from the metal screens form chainmail screens and doors. Waste marble rubble and lome mortar from nearby mines form the masonry walls and marble dust replaces some of the cement and sand content in the concrete mix – resulting in a whiter finish that more effectively reflects the sun’s heat.

The roof acts as an adventurous playscape, offering spaces for parkour and skateboarding, and features a woven bamboo canopy to provide solar shading, designed in collaboration with Webb Yates Engineers. Bamboo was chosen for the canopy in lieu of more widely used long-life aluminium shades, and local weavers will be employed in its ongoing maintenance, resulting in a low-cost, low-carbon solution that creates steady local employment and reinforces the preservation of a traditional craft.

Photography: Edmund Sumner (https://www.edmundsumner.co.uk/), Ankit Jain, Ananya Singhal