Be it Le Corbusier’s idea of buildings as analogous to machines or Alvaro Siza’s zoomorphic vision of architecture, there has been significant discourse on associating novel attributes to buildings—which take the form of either aesthetic or function. Drawing from the school of thought that brings a symbolic character to architecture, Red Vessel or Lal Jahaaz by the Surat-based studio ROOMOOR is built in the likeness of a ship. Located next to the Ubharat beach in Gujarat, India, which is about an hour's drive from Surat, the Red Vessel is an addition to a larger resort master plan that caters to recreational and socio-cultural events. The resort comprises a small water park, a children’s park, congregation lawns and an existing hotel facility housing 35 rooms. The monolithic building in its brick-red hue stands like a proud tall ship anchored to the shore.

The design brief merely necessitated the Indian architects to fulfil functional requirements, by extending the long-existing hotel building with a similar layout, connecting to its internal corridor. The requirement was to build 40 rooms, three dormitories and conference facilities to accommodate cultural events and social gatherings. While the requirements did not demand the architects of anything extraordinary, they desired to go beyond the brief. “[...] We deliberated on how we could go beyond just an extension. How does the old and new connect? Pragmatically, we were also looking for a type that suits the context rather than a merely functional building. It has to be practical, cost-effective and functional yet ecstatic, doing something more than its assigned role,” Dhruv Gusain, Design Partner at ROOMOOR, told STIR.

With a shorter side of the assigned plot facing the sea, the architects saw an opportunity to compose the architecture to facilitate a journey, drawing from the concept, Promenade Architecturale by Le Corbusier. “While visiting the site for the first time, we climbed on top of the roof of the existing hotel building to watch the surroundings under a reddish-yellow sunset sky. From this vantage point, the lights from the trail of ships traversing the sea made a lasting mental imprint,” Gusain recounts. The constant sight of the sea-faring vessels inspired the analogy of the ship and the views made the verticality of the building an asset. The site's context comprises sparse rural settlements and a landscape marked by palms and coconut trees with an omnipresent sea breeze. Thus, for the hospitality architecture cohesion with the context became paramount and the old conventional hotel typology was deconstructed to realise an outward-looking vessel. The references to the vessel enhance the experiential nature of the building—enabling the users to connect to nature through transitional spaces.

The hotel design showcases significant innovation in terms of cost-effectiveness. The corridors not only act as balconies but also as solar shading devices that allow air to flow while blocking the heat, an important strategy to add comfort in hot and humid climates passively. The wind shafts in the Red Vessel create a channel for the sea breeze to ventilate the structure while also allowing it to travel to the rest of the plot.

The hotel building is a combination of three parallel structures that are connected by semi-open corridors that enable visual connectivity with the surrounding beachside. The east-west spanning linear blocks create a self-shading morphology, with the gaps between the blocks acting as wind shafts due to their narrow proportions. The four-storey southern block has 40 rooms with a typical room size of 3.65 X 6.35 metres and an overall capacity to host over 160 guests. This block provides shading to the low-lying eastern terrace, allowing the space to be used even during the day. Additionally, the northernmost block is a two-storey structure with dormitories and a series of terraces that double as breakout areas and small event spaces.

ROOMOOR elucidates how the architecture is designed not just as a space to be inhabited but as a journey that eventually rewards the users with splendid coastal scenery. “One encounters tall red shafts and passes through the entrance, gradually shifting to a dark interior with diffused natural light, a space akin to a primitive cavern. A path begins from tall and narrow space proportions of site constraints that open up to deep panoramic views of the coastal seascape, creating anticipation as one goes through diverse spatial qualities of changing light, depth and compression; culminating in a final release on the open sky terrace, where the sky and the sea converge into a singular line.”

While the Red Vessel holds the visual quality of a monolith that is analogous to a ship’s silhouette, it also draws from the functions of a ship in ways that make architecture a medium to experience nature.