He gave his practice a revealing name – Vastu-Shilpa, which in Sanskrit means ‘ability to create structures’ – that would harmonize the ancestral lyricism of the Mahabharata with the confident tone of Vers une architecture. And he strove for the same kind of balance in his buildings, which drew from traditional construction techniques and from the postulates of the international avant-garde in equal measure. So it was that Balkrishna Doshi became a hinge and nexus between the West and his native India – a role acknowledged through his 2018 Pritzker Prize – and the teacher of several generations of architects in the subcontinent who now mourn his death on 24 January.

Born into a family of artisans, he began his studies in the same year that saw the end of the British Raj, and perhaps it was the nation’s spirit of change that led him to embark for Europe in 1950 and install himself in Paris with his mind set on working under Le Corbusier despite not speaking French. He eventually settled in Ahmedabad, where he helped the Swiss-French master and later Louis Kahn leave their powerful marks, and there he evolved from the bold language of his formidable mentors to a freer organicism that came with an intimate awareness of realities in India, crystallizing it in highly personal projects like the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore and his own office in Ahmedabad, Sangath. Intelligence, respect for a millenary culture, and the celebration of life join hands in all his works.