Between Modernity and Tradition. Le Corbusier's Villa Sarabhai

This paper was presented at the International Conference 'Modern Heritage between Care and Risk' (Venice, 4-5 May 2021), held at the IUAV University of Venice, in collaboration with the Fondation Le Corbusier and Docomomo Italia. The event provided an opportunity for international exchange on key issues of documentation and conservation of the 20th century architectural heritage in a period of rapid social, cultural and political change. The paper was presented on the first day, dedicated to 'Ahmedabad. Laboratory of Modern Architecture', a site manifesto now threatened by the demolition of the dormitories of the Indian Institute of Management of Louis I. Kahn. The article focuses on the Villa Sarabhai, built by Le Corbusier between 1951 and 1956 in Ahmedabad, India, for Manorama Sarabhai, a member of one of India's most powerful business families. The paper traces the circumstances surrounding the design and construction of the villa - starting with the complex intertwining of client, project and building site - through the dense correspondence between the Paris studio and the Indian building site, flanked by photographs taken by Jean Louis Véret on the building sites of Le Corbusier's various factories in Ahmedabad. It was precisely this interweaving of documentation that made it possible, for the first time at the conference, to highlight the obvious discrepancies between the published plans of the villa under study and the actual layout of the factory, thus prompting a reflection on the fate of the building and its transformations, an expression of a state of 'impermanence' that Le Corbusier considered to be a historical necessity.