STEEL TRANSFORMS IDEAS INTO REALITY

Steel facilitates faster construction, dimensional accuracy, and elegance. It opens up boundaries for designers to go beyond mainstream traditional architectural forms. Steel is the only material which can make it possible to bring digital ideas into actual structures, says, ER. MILIND RODE AND RUTUJA RODE, ARCHITECTS META ARCH

Q. What are the major advantages of using steel vis-à-vis conventional materials?

A. The main advantages are faster construction, dimensionalaccuracy, and elegance in sleek structural forms. Secondly, various intricate elemental forms are only possible with steel structures. Organic and free flowing forms which may give functional efficiency are again only achievable with steel.

Q. How structural steel can be used in an innovative manner in construction to provide design aesthetics and at the same time offer economical solution?

A. The steel construction being light in weight by itself offers adequate structuralstrength in any design forms. This reduces any structural liabilities in terms of weight carrying capacities. Steel structures reduces the duration of the construction time period. Thus, we can say that time saved is money being saved.

Q. What is your take on the variety of sections/grades provided by our steel producers for various demands of creativity?

A. The standards sections that are available in the market are limited. However,the modern CNC equipment like laser cutting devices, NC press brakes, water jets, etc. offer unlimited flexibility in design and absolute accuracy.

Q. What trend are we going to witness in next 5-7 years, as far as designing structures with steel is concerned?

A. There is a growing influence of algorithms in design. There are easy to usecomputational design tools to evaluate the design algorithms. This has opened up the boundaries for designers to go beyond mainstream traditional architectural forms. Steel is the only material which can make it possible to bring such digital ideas into actual structures.

Q. What should be the strategy of industry in promoting structural steel construction in India?

A. The Indian Real Estate Market is purely price driven. Till date, the steelstructures are proven to be costlier that regular RCC structures. There will always be a resistance towards structural steel construction due to its cost. The industry should offer different steel alloys for different structural needs. The structural consultants and experts should optimize the structural design so that the cost escalations vis a vis RCC structures does not discourage the market to go forth and use steel.

Q. Which are the iconic steel-specific projects executed by you?

A. Providing concept design perspectives of an upcoming project in SteelFrame Structure designed by Milind Rode, Meta Arch Pvt Ltd for an undisclosed client.