Bartlett Tutor Co-Curates Special Edition of arq: Architectural Research Quarterly

This special issue is Volume 26, Issue 1 of the long-running journal, published by Cambridge University Press, and explores the practice of Indian temple design, production and conservation through the frame of modernity, highlighting diverse epistemological vantages in the making of the modern. Initially published online last September, the journal is also now available as a printed edition.

Dr Chand Inglis co-curated the edition with Dr Crispin Branfoot from the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies. The special issue of the quarterly asks questions about the role of contemporary temple builders in a variety of contexts across the nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries; how these contemporary practices interact with the prevailing western-influenced idea of the architect; the repair of historical buildings and, again, the West’s influence on conservation conventions and practice; and the legacy of colonialism and its translations. It invites a conversation around temple design that is based in the present and honours the complexities of connecting to historical forms while acknowledging contemporary cultural arenas, knowledges and technologies.  

Dr Chand Inglis contributed two papers to the issue – ‘Indian temple architecture and modernity: practices, knowledge production, methodologies’, co-written with Dr Branfoot, which introduces the themes throughout the quarterly, and ‘Living (in) the archive’, which unpacks the importance of archives in the present day to those who have built them, and their power to unlock a more complex and layered landscape of knowledge in temple-building than is typically acknowledged.


Dr Chand Inglis is Associate Professor in Architectural History and Theory at The Bartlett. She teaches Year 2 and 3 of History and Theory of Architecture module on Architecture BSc (ARB/RIBA Part 1), and is the module coordinator for Year 3 of that module and departmental tutor for Architecture MSci Year 2 and 3. She also teaches Year 1 History and Theory of Architecture on Architecture MSci (ARB/RIBA Part 1) and Year 1 History and Theory of Engineering and Architecture on Engineering & Architectural Design MEng (ARB/RIBA Part 1 CIBSE JBM).

arq: Architectural Research Quarterly is available for UCL students to read or download free online at UCL Library Services (after logging in to your SIngle Sign-on), or to buy in hard copy, priced at £113. To purchase a physical copy of the journal, please contact Cambridge University Press’ Journals Customer Service team at this link: click here to order a hard copy.

More information

• Order a physical copy of arq: Architectural Research Quarterly from Cambridge University Press
• Read arq: Architectural Research Quarterly online free at UCL Library Services

Image: ‘Motishah Tunk (1840s) under renovation in 2015, Shatrunjaya hill, Palitana, Gujarat, India. Photograph by Ashish Trambadia.