24/07/2022
Early in 1979, Archt. Geoffrey Bawa was summoned out of the blue to a meeting with President J R Jayawardene who commissioned him to design a new Parliament. J R Jayawardene gave him a free hand, with the one proviso that the building had to be ready within three years. Bawa proposed to drain the marshes and site the new Parliament on a strict north-south axis atop an island in the middle of an artificial lake. A detailed design was drawn up and the construction was entrusted to a Japanese company Mitsui. Bawa's designs incorporated a symmetrical debating chamber similar to that of the Palace of Westminster, ignoring the fact that Sri Lankans rarely elected two opposing parties of equal size. Bawa later justified the design by pointing to traditional audience halls such as those at Polonnaruwa and Kandy. The central pavilion contained the debating chamber under a sweeping copper roof, but the symmetry was broken deliberately by the five ancillary pavilions, each with its own roof, that were added in a seemingly random fashion around its perimeter, creating a succession of open-sided courts. The ancillary pavilions included the MPs' dining room and a massive loggia for staging public meetings. The debating chamber was planned symmetrically with opposing lines of seats facing each other across the central axis of the Speaker's chair. At the official opening of the Parliament, the President would proceed in state from his official residence in the city, cross the causeway to the island and arrive at the front piazza. Here a pair of vast silver doors opened to reveal a grand staircase rising up to the floor of the House. The furnishings of the chamber were of dark calamander wood and the suspended ceiling was formed by catenaries of small aluminium bars that glittered like a tent of gold, inspired by a metal handbag that had belonged to Bawa's mother. A huge chandelier of silver coconut fronds made by artist Laki Senanayake hung above the centre of the chamber and silver korale flags lined the galleries, reflecting the concealed lighting upwards towards the ceiling. Bawa dreamed of creating a friendly monument where people would meet their elected representatives in the ambalamas that were dotted around the landscaped lakeside gardens, and would flock to public meetings in the great open-sided hall.
