28/01/2026
Open Architectural Design Competition for the Design of Ten Storied Academic Building for Dhaka Residential Model College (DRMC)
Competition Entry - IAB; Plural Works and Cactus Consultants JV
Team Members :
Nazmul Ahsan, S M Rumman Mashrur Chowdhury, A K M Saleh Ahmed Anik, Nabila Ferdousi, Pronoy Chowdhury Shuvo, Md. Rashid Rashedin, Sakibur Rahman, Ahsan Rezwan, Devanjon Malaker Sudipta, Omar Faruque, Minhaz Mehedi, Mumu Chakma, Arushi Anzil.
'Since its establishment in 1960, Dhaka Residential Model College (DRMC) has served as a premier academic institution within Bangladesh, cultivating generations of learners across its expansive 52-acre campus. Today, with more than 6,000 students and an infrastructure that has exceeded its intended lifespan, the college faces a spatial and pedagogical challenge: accommodating a significantly expanded academic population within a campus originally designed for a much smaller cohort. With classroom shortages forcing a two-shift system and the existing low-density layout reaching functional limits, the transition toward a high-density vertical academic facility has become both inevitable and urgent.
However, the shift to verticality is not solely a matter of structural provision—it is fundamentally a social and spatial question. The traditional DRMC campus is organized around open grounds, walkable greens, and horizontally distributed social spaces where connectivity, interaction, and institutional culture are naturally fostered. The introduction of a ten-storied tower into this environment risks fragmenting these communal relationships by isolating activities across stacked floors.
The design concept “Common [Vertical] Ground” emerges as a response to this critical concern. In conventional campus typologies, the ground plane operates as the central locus of community—the place where ideas intersect, interdisciplinary exchange occurs, and academic life becomes visible. Vertical expansion challenges this logic by pushing academic programs upward, potentially creating stratified layers detached from the collective experience of campus.
“Common [Vertical] Ground” reconceptualizes verticality as an extension of DRMC’s shared landscape rather than its departure. The proposal weaves the spatial, social, and symbolic qualities of the ground plane through the building’s full height, creating a series of interconnected platforms—breakout zones, learning terraces, double-height commons, and shared atriums—that function as multiple grounds in the sky. These vertically distributed communal spaces prevent isolation, support everyday collaboration, and restore the sense of “groundedness” characteristic of DRMC’s campus identity.
Positioned at the core of the Mohammadpur site
—a 3,000 sq. m field identified for redevelopment —the project is conceived as a future-ready academic hub aligned with the competition brief’s priorities: climate responsiveness, environmental sensitivity, and architectural excellence. By integrating open spaces into upper levels, optimizing natural ventilation and daylight, and ensuring clear interconnectivity with existing academic buildings, the design transforms vertical ascension into a cohesive communal experience. The journey from the first to the tenth floor becomes not a departure from the DRMC community, but an elevation of it.
Through “Common [Vertical] Ground”, the project articulates a new paradigm for high-density educational architecture in Dhaka—one that maintains the horizontal campus spirit while embracing the vertical spatial demands of the future.'
