Mumbai's Colonial Architecture

[Bombay Boy]

bombay also has a lot of renaissance style buildings. all of ballard estate, elphinstone college, etc. most of it though is a hot-potch of styles - gothic, indo-saracenic, art deco, baroque, etc

[DeMorgan]

Hello,

Do you happen to know if any of the old colonial buildings have survived in the Matoonga area of Mumbai.

My family lived there in the 1820's and ran a gunpowder factory in the old guncarriage works, and my 3 x great grandfather was buried in the church there.

I have never seen it, but I understand that his fellow officers erected a plaque in the church to commorate his life.

I understand from Indian friends here in the UK that Matoonga is now the university quarter, is this correct?

They were married in Bombay Cathedral, does this survive?

Thanks for posting the great pictures of Mumbai.

Regards

Nick

[Bombay Boy]

the old buildings were mostly there till the recent past. now they are being changed quite fast. the important, protected ones will stay of course. matunga is still a lovely locality

[Sridhar]

DeMorgan:

Matunga is a bustling, densely populated residential neighbourhood, besides having some very good institutions, that you refer to. It is the little-Madras in Bombay, since a very large proportion of its population consists of Tamil speakers.

The first Engineering institute in Bombay, and still its best, is the Victoria Jubilee Technical Institute (since renamed Veer Jeejamata Technological Insitute, but everybody refers to it by its acnonym VJTI), located in Matunga. There are a couple of pictures of the institute at its website.

http://www.vjti.ac.in/home_history.asp

Adjacent to VJTI is the University Institute of Chemical Technology (formerly University Department of Chemical Technology, which gives its familiar acronym of UDCT), arguably India's best institution for Chemical Engineering.

[Bombay Boy]

not all of matunga is densely crowded. the five garden area and the parsi and hindu colonies are nice low-rise districts. one of my favourite residential neighbourhoods and one of the most middle-class ones

[Sridhar]

Matunga is actually mostly low-rise, I don't remember seeing any high-rises in the area, unless new ones have come up in the last 2-3 years.

[Bombay Boy]

quite a few

not just low-rise. i meant a lot of it is also well laid out and comfortable to walk in, not like the main market or the south indian areas

[Cov Boy]

This is Mumbai to me with its Colonial architecture which is full of history and culture as it was a British establishment dont forget as well as Portugese originally. The Area's like Ballard Estate, Apollo Bunder, Fort, Marine Drive is what Mumbai is at the heart in essence. More should be done to preserve the hertiage buildings as this is what tourists like me are interested in & not just skycrapers. You can find skycrapers in any city and Mumbai is no exception. I must admit many of the high rises in Mumbai do look cool and some fit well in their surroundings but I deplore the idea of demolishing the hertiage structures to make way for towers in any city!!

Elphinstone College is a wonderful example of what restoration can achieve and it would be worth visiting that building for me as well as lots of other tourists. Mumbai can earn millions from hertiage tourism, look at London or New Delhi for example, it makes millions every year from tourists and the direct & indirect benefits to the local economy are enormous. My favourite is VT, High Court, Municipal Corp. Building, Army & Navy Bldg & many more of which some need restoration. If ever there was a fund for saving and restoring the heritage buildings I would donate.

[Bombay Boy]

i went inside elphinstone college with a heritage tour guide. was quite dissapointing with ugly concrete additions all around. money seems to be the problem here, esp with so many of the buildings occupied by government agencies and not paying for its upkeep. i would say rationalise rents, give incentives for preserving heritage, instead of punishments for neglecting them while at the same time not allowing the landlord to get the market price, and allow rentals by high paying tenants like banks, etc. most of the best preserved buildings are ones occupied by private parties (standard chartered, hsbc, deutsche bank, reliance, etc). those under government departments are in a terrible state

[Cov Boy]

I agree with you Bombay Boy thats the way to go forward. It does seem that the buildings that are neglected are the ones occupied by the Government! Also the rent Control Act does not help I heard? We all know that hertiage buildings could be lost forever due to the neglect and many buildings will not be financially viable to restore if this continues. Shame what you said about the state of the building inside I thought it would be just as good as it is the outside. Yeah the HSBC, Standard Chartered etc you mentioned are very good examples of good maintenance and restoration.

[Cov Boy]

How is the renovation of VT coming long? Is the interior going to get done too? I see a new roof as been layed on VT. The domes on VT look very black and bare. Looks like the climate has taken its toll. VT is the pride of Mumbai in my opinion and needs looking after more being one of the true icons of the city. Hope this building can be brought back to its former glory. Please post more pics of this building as I can never get tired of looking at that building!

[DeMorgan]

Hello,

The following photographs come from an album collected by my great great grandfather Captain Charles James Barton who was an officer in the Bombay Artillery, part of the East India Company.

In December 1857 he returned with the expeditionary force from Persia.

The first photo shows the old Bombay Artillery Mess at Matoonga [Matunga]. This was where his father Captain James Barton had been stationed in 1827.



Nearby was a Fives Court. Fives was a game played originally against the outside wall of a church. A very hard ball was hit with a reinforced glove, in much he same way that Squash is played today.



The following photo shows the Adelphi Hotel, which was probably where my ancestor was staying.



He appears to have been interested in the local architecture because another shows Byculla Temple.



Does anybody know if this still survives? Where is it in relationship to Mumbai?

I am not sure what the significance of the following photo of "the woodstack" was?

Was this just fuel, or would it have been part of a Burning Ghat for Hindu funerals perhaps?



The last photo shows Pattinars pulled up in a beach.



You will have to forgive the quality of the photos, because they are now very old and delicate.

Regards

Nick

[DeMorgan]

Hello,

Here's another photo that has come to light.



It shows what is probably a camp for Bombay Artillery Officers in December 1857 on the Esplanade.

Presumably they are camping in the garden of a bungalow.

As these troops had just come back from Persia, and would later be marching inland up the ghats to Ahmednugger, it is quite possible that there was insufficient accomodation in Bombay to take them all at this time.

Regards

Nick

[drailton]

Does anyone have any photographs of a building that was known as Lansdowne House in Lansdowne Road in Mumbai? In the 1940s is was apartments. Its use and name and name of the road it was in will all have probably changed by now. One end of Lansdowne Road was very close to the Gateway of India. I am interested in photographs of this building as it was in the 1940/50s and as it is now, if it still exists.

Thank you.

David Railton
England

[Mahratta]

copyright David Berkowitz @ flickr

image hosted on flickr


image hosted on flickr


image hosted on flickr

[yudhacalmum]

oh i just love to visit the town areas of both kolkata and mumbai
though the doric structures of kolkata are ill maintained and most of them are in ruins but still more 'princely and royal'
but the gothic architecture of mumbai is really amazing
not very stately but such a business-like appearance

[sk11983]

Looking at the photo of Bombay 1857 - Adelphi Hotel i became interested, and nowhere on the net cud i find info, Finally some info i found Cathedral And John Connon School website, it mentions Adelphi was purchased to build a school


"THE SCOTTISH SCHOOLS

In the meantime, in 1876 The Bombay Scottish Education Society had been founded. As the Society did not have a School, the first classes were held in temporary premises in Meadows Street till a house was hired at 9, Hornby Road. Two years later the Adelphi Hotel in Byculla was purchased for Rs. 50,000, and an additional school was opened there. This remained the headquarters of the Society till 1881 when a beautiful building was put up on the Esplanade costing Rs. 87,000. The new school at the Esplanade was named after Mr. John Connon, a well known philanthropist and Chief Registrar of Bombay. In 1902 the Society took over the small school conducted by the Wesleyan Church in Colaba Causeway. This became the kindergarten department of the John Connon School till it was closed in 1920, when the accommodation became unsuitable. At that time many Europeans lived in Byculla, and in 1912, the Society decided to build a new School in Agripada, which was opened by Lord Sydenham."

[bains1971]

Those Gothic building still in very good condition. amazing.

[Raisey457]

India is indeed a mystical place and the colonial arhictecture of the buildings is so amazing...I am from the Philippines and I find your country's treasures in culture and heritage unique and amazing...

[nilesh30]

the old temple image post by demorgan is still survive at byculla and it is just walking distance away from my house
thanx love it