Loom Works
Pit looms need north light, still air, and neighbours within earshot.
A-202 · Perspective from the north-east · massing only
- Programme
- Weaving workshop and housing for 14 families
- Floor area
- 1,940 m²
- Height to parapet
- 11.20 m
- Storeys
- 3
- Structural bays
- 8
- Status
- Built · 2023
The weavers' cooperative asked for workshop and home on one plot without either swallowing the other. We stacked them: looms on the ground, courtyards and dwellings above, a shared stair every two bays so no family walks past another's door.
The workshop roof is a sawtooth turned to true north. Measured at noon in May, the loom floor holds 480 lux with no artificial light on.
Construction ran in four phases over nineteen months so that no loom stopped working.
Team
Ira Menon
Design lead
Nikita Bose
Project architect
Bhatt & Rao Consulting
Structure
Bhujodi Weavers' Cooperative
Client
Materials
Furthest: Steel sawtooth trusses — 318 km
How it went
- January 2021
The cooperative asked for a building that would not stop the looms.
- June 2021
Phasing agreed: four phases, nineteen months, no loom idle.
- October 2021
Phase one on site. Six families moved twice, by agreement.
- December 2023
Handover. Fourteen homes, twenty-two looms.