If you have ever spent any time at any of the country’s top hotels, there’s a fairly good chance you have seen their work. After all, the architect firm RKA, run by the Delhi-based father-son team of Rajinder and Rahul Kumar, has designed, conceptualized, and or renovated more hotels in India than any other group. And with a firm history that spans over four decades, that’s hardly a surprise. Given that the elder Kumar got his start in the late 1960s, it’s Rahul who mostly runs things now, with his father had assumed the role of a mentor.
“We are working in the office for a Public Service Undertaking. We were pleasantly surprised when they gave us the leeway to layout the design in a far more spacious manner than most companies that want to maximize efficiency and get in as many workers as they possibly can. Then, the pandemic struck. Thankfully, because of that freedom of movement we had incorporated into the design, we were in the happy place of already having post-COVID distancing norms in the way the office is laid out,” says Rahul. Indeed, this happy coincidence has played out again and again, especially in RKA’s design of hotels of budget hotels or 7-star getaways.
At a recent webinar organised by ITC Hotels, the duo spoke about the huge role nature and environment have played in their designs. “ITC Hotels was one of the first companies to insist on having ‘green’ as a design in their buildings, even before it was the requirement most seem to require today,” said Rajinder, adding, “Since then, it’s been a privilege to have seen other hospitality and tourism chains incorporate the same into their aesthetic.” RKA has helped establish that norm to no small extent, beginning from when Rajinder was just starting out in the late 60s when he got commissioned to design tourist accommodation in the hilly areas of what was then Punjab; incorporating natural elements and using locally-sourced materials in a modern aesthetic.
When he started RKA later in the 70s, he carried forward that design sensibility, helping shape not just how hotels in the country came to be built. And Rahul continued the legacy when he joined the family business in the 90s. “When we designed the ITC Gardenia in Bengaluru, it included features not really seen in other hotels like windows that opened, and open-air atria in several spaces within the building to let guests feel that they were in nature.
In fact, that’s what made it the greenest hotel in the world when it first opened. Now, in a post- COVID reality, with the danger of viral aerosols, features like that must become commonplace, so that people feel a sense of security, even when they are at a new property,” says Rahul, noting that all public spaces of the future will need to follow suit. Given that RKA is not going anywhere, we are confident of their designs for our collective future.
Sustainable leanings
Rajinder was just starting out in the late 60’s when he got commissioned to design tourist accommodation in Punjab; incorporating natural elements and locally-sourced materials in a modern aesthetic. When he started RKA later in the 70s, he carried forward that design sensibility which Rahul continued when he
joined the business in the 90s.