LIGHTS!

Light… natural or artificial… is like jewelry, an accessory for a building. Its like the 'sringaar' that is applied to beautify something - ornamentation. I admit that I had never noticed before how even the bland buildings get a colorful flavor with the help of ‘lights’. This time the Diwali celebrations pointed out that to me in open. 

After a routine long day, coming back from work, spending an hour in the pale yellow/white light of metro compartment, walking down back home you are greeted by the same buildings that you see daily – the same ‘block’ architecture with common elements, common technical faults and even common looks. But once, during this festive season you are welcomed by lights… all over the place. The buildings, for once, lose their boundaries and merge into one another as if they lie with a layer of lights on them. Everything – the corner balconies, the glass railings, the MS-balusters, the out-of-context cornices and motifs, the excessively provided glass doors – everything is overpowered by those beautiful lights spread over those boxes (no offense) uniformly. Suddenly, the road is converted into a ‘space’ highlighted by the lights around. On the other hand, very seldom you see such lights placed according to the architecture of a building – enhancing and justifying all the niches, parapets, voids, and massing. Whatever way they are used, they indeed put life in (though for short time) what seems to be a dead immovable mass.

Louis I. Kahn, the master Architect said, “The sun never knew how great it was until it hit the side of a building..”

The randomly clicked ‘show of lights’ on my way back home. Delight!