SHORT DESCRIPTION

Bangalore is blessed with built heritage set up as a large army Cantonment by the British. The Government Kannada Higher Primary School located at Ulsoor Bangalore was built by the British as a elementary school in the year 1913 to educate children of the ancillary staff. It is situated in an extremely busy neighbourhood, on a chaotic street with a narrow access it’s easy to miss the school. But once you chance upon it you fall in love. The heritage building is one of the 3 structures on a 30,000 sft site. Of the other 2, one was built recently to the house classrooms since the dilapidated roof of the original structure raised a safety concern. The original structure became a dumping ground for junk and was headed for demolition. The structure had a symmetrical plan with a central hall & two wings. It was a combination of brick and stone masonry with a double height Mangalore tile roof supported on a solid timber truss. The gabled roof with Gothic windows and wooden facia further accentuated the colonial style of architecture. The restoration of the heritage building was executed by addressing its existing state and retarding deterioration. The tiled roof was giving way in most sections with the walls damaged from the seepage of water through the roof. Most of the wooden rafters had rotted, the walls, floors damaged, with the building left unused for over a decade. The plastering on the outer wall below the sill level was broken at many places. Flooring needed repair works to be carried out to close the broken red oxide cement surfaces. The door frames & window frames, the old cast iron Birmingham were deteriorated and needed to be painted.