Educational and Community Architecture in Bengaluru
We design learning spaces that breathe, carefully integrating classrooms with the existing landscape and the daily rhythm of school life.
The single classroom addition at RBANMS primary school, alive with the energy of children. The elevated classroom creates a sheltered play area underneath, and the design is light, playful, and built around the existing jackfruit tree.
An animated diagram showing the concept for the RBANMS school extension. The drawing illustrates how the classroom is lifted above the ground, preserving the open play space and integrating the structure with the trees.
A sectional drawing of the RBANMS classroom, animated with silhouettes of children playing. This visual explains how the space is designed for its users, creating different zones for learning and recreation.
The RBANMS classroom extension next to the playground. The lightweight steel structure and simple materials were chosen to be economical and quick to erect, minimizing disruption to the school.
A view from under the elevated classroom, showing how the structure carefully navigates around a large, mature tree. Preserving the existing natural context was a primary goal of the project.
Looking up between the old school building and our new classroom extension, with the branches of a tree reaching for the sky. The design creates a close relationship between the children, their learning space, and nature.
Sunlight filtering through the canopy of a banyan tree next to the classroom. We design to capture these simple, beautiful moments, making them part of the everyday experience of the space.
A detail of the landscape design at the RBANMS school, where a wavy concrete curb navigates around the base of a tree. Even small gestures can create a playful and considered environment.
A duplicate of ID 87.
The view of the classroom extension from the sandpit, showing the relationship between the play area and the sheltered space below the classroom.
About Educational & Community Projects
The RBANMS primary school extension illustrates our commitment to site-integrated design. By elevating the classroom on a lightweight steel structure, we preserved the playground floor and allowed the existing jackfruit tree to define the space, rather than removing it to make room for construction. This approach ensures the building serves the existing community without compromising the open, breathable play areas children rely on.
Community and educational projects require a specific type of patience. Architecture in these settings is not just about square footage or standard layouts. It is about understanding how a building interacts with the people who inhabit it daily, particularly children. In the case of the RBANMS primary school, we had to reconcile the need for a new classroom with the reality of a dense, existing schoolyard.
Our approach was to use a lightweight steel frame to lift the classroom, a decision that serves two purposes. First, it creates a shaded, protected zone underneath for children to play during the monsoon or hot afternoons. Second, it allows the roots of the mature jackfruit tree to remain undisturbed, maintaining the site's environmental character.
We believe good educational architecture encourages discovery. By manipulating light through simple steel windows and creating connections to the surrounding canopy, we turn a classroom into a part of the landscape. We utilize economical materials like steel and concrete, focusing on the quality of light and the logic of the structure rather than decorative finishes. These projects are always a dialogue between the existing heritage of the school and the needs of a growing student body. We look for the story in the site, finding ways to make the new structure feel like an inevitable, welcomed addition.
Mathew and Ghosh
We are Mathew and Ghosh Architects, a team of architects who view our work as a continuous conversation with Bengaluru. Our practice is built on the belief that architecture is a slow, meditative process, whether we are restoring a heritage site or designing a new schoolyard for children to grow in.
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