Pune is the eighth largest city in India and one of the fastest growing in the country. Many of the new residents are young professionals attracted by the local auto and tech industries. For their resettlement, satellite residential areas are created, built up mainly with the same type of towers. Unlike most cases, Amanora Park Town has built housing for more than 25,000 people in eleven years - multi-storey buildings and custom-designed villas. However, fierce competition between developers forces them to carry out construction as quickly as possible and at lower costs, that is, to abandon high-quality and "interesting" projects.
The solution was the Future Towers concept, developed by MVRDV taking into account the specifics of the Indian housing market and the local context in general. Instead of the sixteen towers originally planned for the site, the architects proposed one building with nine wings. The benefit for the investor is the low cost of construction and the relatively high cost of elevators in India. It is the elevators that are expensive, not long corridors, but thanks to the well-thought-out layout, Future Towers for 1,068 apartments (140,000 m2) costs only four elevator nodes (each of the towers would have at least one).
The height of the building varies from 17 to 30 floors; the wings form a "honeycomb" lattice; spacious courtyards are created between them. Elevation differences have defined the silhouette with peaks and slopes on which private and public terraces are created. Balconies on the facades differ in height and width (single and double), as well as in shape (there are L-shaped in the plan). The apartments are also different, from 45 m2 to 450 m2, which ensures social diversity: young visitors live side by side with people who have long settled in Pune, there are large and small families, residents of different incomes.
The apartments are provided with a simple and efficient natural ventilation system, which simultaneously brings fresh air there and acts as an exhaust hood for kitchens: it is typical of Indian apartment buildings. The layout also takes into account Vastu Shastra, the traditional Hindu set of architectural rules: in recent decades, India has been expecting this from new projects.
On the façade, there are multi-colored openings, basically the shelter required by local regulations in case of fire (they are necessary for long corridors). They provide natural ventilation in central corridors and other public spaces, as well as recreational areas and 'attractions' for different parts of the building, including a mini golf course, yoga area, playgrounds for toddlers and teens.
The courtyards are connected by multi-colored triangular "arches" four stories high: through them runs the main route half a kilometer long. There are gardens, playgrounds, sports grounds, etc. Among the amenities intended for residents, there are also "luxurious" ones, for example, a 50-meter pool: with such a scale of construction, a tiny part of the budget went to it.
Future Towers for 5,000 people is only the first stage of a larger project of the same name. Now the architects are working on its second stage, there will be three in total. Upon completion of the implementation, the array will accommodate 3,500 apartments, its total area will be 370,000 m2.
