New Delhi: A baroque Spanish-inspired house in South Delhi is set to be demolished to make way for a larger property. For archaeologist, curator and art historian Anica Mann—its disappearance is another step toward the “death of architecture in Delhi” and the rise of cookie-cutter, developer-built houses. Love, loss and longing for the city’s old homes were the central motif of Mann’s presentation during the session ‘Excavating Urbanity’ at the Kiran Nadar Museum earlier this month.
She views this transformation as a loss for Delhi’s modern architectural heritage—one that was built post-Independence. “The memory of the modern is being forgotten, just as the memory of Partition was,” said Mann, who has been archiving and documenting the city’s history from the lens of architecture on her Instagram handle, Delhi Houses . It’s part of a project by the same name that celebrates and preserves the fading memories and the people who shaped it.
The event, which was part of KDM’s Fabulation Project, included a discussion with social anthropologist Sarover Zaidi and architect Rafiq Kidwai. It could have easily been a nostalgic and maudlin trip down memory lane. Instead, it traced how Delhi’s architecture has evolved to suit the needs of the moment.
A baroque Spanish-inspired house in South Delhi. It’s being demolished to make way for a larger property. | Delhi Houses / Instagram The architects of Delhi’s houses made space for the belongings of the fami.