Rahul Mehrotra in Conversation with Jarrett Ley

Jarrett Ley, a current student in the Critical, Curatorial and Conceptual Practices Program at Columbia GSAPP, speaks with Indian architect Rahul Mehrotra, founder of RMA Architects, on the occasion of the Kenneth Frampton Endowed Lecture he presented on November 8, 2017. They discuss Mehrotra’s Magic Bus project, an educational campus which uses ordinary materials found in informal settlements in order to help young students feel more at ease while training away from home. Mehrotra also touches on permanence in architecture and the architect’s role as negotiator and advocate between a project’s different clients. “How do you design a house for ten years? How do you recycle everything? What’s the material geography? How does the material come in? Where does it go out? I think we talk about sustainability, but in our pedagogy it doesn’t find its way.” —Rahul Mehrotra More information on RMA Architects at http://rmaarchitects.com More information on the Kenneth Frampton Endowed Lecture at https://www.arch.columbia.edu/events/732-the-kenneth-frampton-endowed-lecture-rahul-mehrotra