The directors of Project Orange return to Sri Lanka, experiencing the good and bad sides of the city of Galle as well as a literary festival
Photo 1: Kahanda Kanda
The two of us work together and holiday together. In February, we took our first flight in six years to return to Sri Lanka. It is a country of great natural beauty and generous hospitality. Our first stop was to Kahanda Kanda, a small hotel set amid a small tea plantation overlooking Koggala Lake. The pink of the wall is recognisable as a homage to Luis Barragan – but how brilliant is looks. The reflection in the infinity pool with the palm trees behind creates a compelling vista that invites you to dive in.
Photo 2: No 11, 33rd Lane, Bagatelle Road, Colombo 03
No11, 33rd Lane, Bagatelle Road is the iconic address of the late Geoffrey Bawa’s own house and studio, and you can now stay in his first-floor guest apartment. The living room is a serene modernist space with a white glossy painted floor and is furnished with his eclectic collection of old and new pieces. Begun in 1959, the house was expanded over the years, though it gives little away from the outside. Within are a series of connected rooms and courtyards, which are cool, beautifully curated and still used. The photograph shows a ground-floor room. As an overnight guest, you have breakfast served on Bawa’s dining table, which is utterly sublime.
Photo 3: Decay
Galle Fort is a special place, designated as a Unesco World Heritage Site, built in 1588 by the Portuguese, then fortified by the Dutch during the 17th century. Within its walls are shady streets lined with colourful houses, cafés and shops, although it is the courtyards behind the grand facades that are most special. While it is a tourist destination, it is also home to a diverse community with numerous civic buildings and public spaces. However, not every building has been refurbished; there are charming pockets of decay reminding us of the impermanence of architecture.
Photo 4: Modern Galle
The newer city of Galle lies on the mainland and is a heady mix of colonial villas, choked roads and modern buildings. I particularly loathe this example of what happens when architecture is reduced to a concrete frame clad with a generic glazing product. The facade is completely unsuitable to the climate and must heat up the interior to oven temperature. The vertical blinds will do little to help. There are likely AC units to make it habitable. The tacky retail signage and advertising adds nothing to the streetscape. The Domino Frame can be many things; most of them not architecture.
Photo 5: Shyam Selvadurai
The Galle Literary Festival is a truly wondrous event, bringing together writers from across Asia and further away. There is always an architectural component, which this year was a talk by Shiromi Pinto about her novel Plastic Emotions. She conjectures about the meetings between an elderly Le Corbusier and the young Minnette de Silva. A tradition of the festival is to take lunch with one of the authors, sometimes in someone’s home. Shyam Selvadurai is a writer whose debut novel, Funny Boy, tenderly describes the experience of an LGBTQ+ boy finding his way against the background of ethnic tensions. It is a game-changing book, and over a delicious lunch for 12, he generously shared more stories.
James Soane and Christopher Ash are directors and founders of Project Orange
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