University campus buildings must balance diverse functions—administration, academics, social spaces, and student services—within a single cohesive structure. The recently completed Prestige University campus building in Indore, India, demonstrates how stepped terraces and passive design strategies, inspired by historic stepwell architecture, can achieve this integration while significantly reducing energy demand. Designed by Sanjay Puri Architects, the five-level building occupies a 13-hectare (32-acre) university campus and delivers 9,000 m² (96,875 sf) of programmed space through a diagonal sectional organization and an entirely accessible stepped rooftop. This article examines the design principles, spatial organization, and university campus building design strategies that make this project a compelling case study for building professionals.
Prestige University Campus: A Five-Level Building Organized Around a Diagonal Section
The Prestige University campus building is organized along a diagonal axis that cuts through the structure from the northern point, creating an indoor street that serves as the primary circulation spine. This diagonal section divides the building into distinct functional zones while maintaining visual and physical connectivity across all five levels.
Ground Floor: Public and Administrative Core
The ground floor houses the most publicly accessible functions:
- A food court for student and faculty dining
- A full auditorium for events and assemblies
- Seminar halls for academic presentations
- Administrative offices for university management
- Main entrance lobby connected to the diagonal indoor street
This arrangement ensures that high-traffic functions remain at grade for convenient access, while quieter functions occupy the upper levels. The diagonal street provides natural wayfinding, guiding visitors from the entrance through the building’s core.
First and Second Floors: Library and Academic Spaces
The first floor contains the library components, connected by a bridge that spans the diagonal indoor street. This bridge serves both a functional and experiential role, allowing users to cross the central void while maintaining visual connection to the activity below.
The second floor houses common classrooms that benefit from natural light and cross-ventilation through sectional volumes and open courts. These open courts double as overflow areas for recreational activities, demonstrating how terraced plaza construction principles can be applied to academic building typologies.
Third and Fourth Floors: Tiered Classrooms and Faculty Facilities
The third floor contains tiered classrooms designed for lecture-style instruction. These rooms take advantage of the stepped sectional profile to accommodate sloped seating without additional structural complexity. The fourth floor houses all administrative and faculty facilities, providing a quieter work environment separated from the student activity zones below.
This vertical stacking of functions—from public at grade to private at the top—follows established principles for sustainable campus design while accommodating the specific needs of a university administration building.
Stepwell Precedent: 463 Stepped Platforms for a Rooftop Garden and Open Auditorium
The most distinctive feature of the Prestige University building is its stepped roof, which rises diagonally from the northern point and creates 463 individual stepped platforms covering the entire roof surface. This 9,000 m² (96,875 sf) rooftop garden is fully accessible to students and faculty, transforming what would typically be an unused surface into a vibrant social and recreational amenity.
The Stepwell as a Design Precedent
The built form deliberately evokes images of Indian stepwells, a vernacular building typology that has existed for over 1,100 years. Historic stepwells served dual purposes:
- Water storage: Stepped wells accessed groundwater through descending platforms
- Social interaction: The stepped configuration created amphitheater-like spaces for community gatherings, festivals, and daily social life
Sanjay Puri Architects translated this spatial concept into a contemporary institutional building by scaling the stepped configuration across the entire roof plane. The result is an open auditorium that functions both as a garden and as an informal gathering space for the university community.
Functional Benefits of the Stepped Roof
The stepped roof configuration delivers several practical advantages:
- Each platform can support planting beds, creating a layered green roof without complex irrigation systems
- Stepped surfaces allow students to sit, study, or socialize at various elevation levels
- The diagonal stepping creates natural sightlines toward the campus below
- Multiple access points from different floor levels ensure the roof is well used
- The stepped form reduces wind load compared to a flat roof at the same height
Passive Design Strategies: North Lighting, Courtyards, and Natural Ventilation
The Prestige University building achieves significant energy savings through passive design strategies rooted in traditional Indian architecture. The building minimizes dependence on artificial lighting and air conditioning, contributing to long-term operational cost savings and reduced carbon footprint.
North-Facing Orientation and Daylighting
The building is oriented to maximize north lighting, which provides consistent, glare-free illumination throughout the day. North-facing light is particularly valuable in educational buildings because:
- It produces minimal heat gain compared to east or west exposure
- Color temperature remains stable throughout the day
- Direct solar glare is eliminated, improving visual comfort for reading and screen work
- Diffuse north light reduces the need for window shading devices
This orientation strategy reduces artificial lighting energy consumption while improving the quality of the learning environment. The sectional volumes—the open courts that rise through multiple floors—further distribute daylight deep into the building, reaching interior spaces that would otherwise require electric lighting.
Courtyards as Environmental Modulators
The open courts within the building serve as thermal buffers and ventilation chimneys. During the hot Indian climate, these courtyards:
- Promote stack-effect ventilation, drawing warm air upward and out of the building
- Provide shaded outdoor spaces that remain usable during hot months
- Allow cross-ventilation through classrooms on multiple floors
- Create microclimates through evaporative cooling from planted surfaces
Energy Performance Comparison
The following table compares the passive design features of the Prestige University building with conventional institutional building approaches.
| Design Feature | Prestige University Building | Conventional Institutional Building |
|---|---|---|
| Primary orientation | North-facing for glare-free daylight | Variable, often east-west |
| Roof surface | 463 stepped platforms with garden | Flat, typically unused |
| Ventilation strategy | Stack-effect via sectional volumes | Mechanical HVAC primary |
| Daylight penetration | Deep via open courts and light wells | Perimeter-only, limited depth |
| Passive cooling | Courtyards and stepped shading | Relies on air conditioning |
| Outdoor amenity space | 9,000 m² accessible rooftop garden | Minimal or non-accessible roof |
| Cultural design reference | Historic stepwell typology | Typically none |
This high-performance building envelope design approach demonstrates how passive strategies can significantly reduce the mechanical load on institutional buildings in hot climates.
Construction and Material Considerations for Terraced Campus Buildings
Building a five-level stepped structure with an accessible green roof requires careful attention to structural systems, waterproofing, drainage, and material selection. The following considerations are relevant for building professionals working on similar terraced campus building projects.
Structural System for Stepped Configurations
The diagonal stepping of the roof structure creates varying floor-to-roof heights across the building. The structural design must accommodate:
- Lateral load distribution across the stepped geometry
- Differential settlement between sections at different roof elevations
- Additional dead load from the rooftop garden and planting medium
- Live load from students and faculty occupying the stepped platforms
- Thermal movement across the extended roof surface
Waterproofing and Drainage for Stepped Green Roofs
The 9,000 m² rooftop garden requires a robust waterproofing and drainage system. Key specifications include:
- A multi-layer waterproofing membrane rated for intensive green roof loads
- A drainage composite layer to prevent water accumulation on the roof deck
- Root barrier protection to prevent vegetation from penetrating the membrane
- Overflow drains at each terrace level to manage stormwater during heavy rainfall
- Lightweight growing medium to reduce structural load while supporting plant growth
Material Selection for Durability and Thermal Performance
Materials for the Prestige University building were selected to complement the passive design strategy while ensuring long-term durability in the Indore climate, which experiences hot summers and a monsoon season.
- Reinforced concrete frame provides thermal mass, moderating indoor temperature swings
- Stone paving on the stepped terraces absorbs less heat than metal or dark surfaces
- Glass selection prioritizes high visible light transmittance with low solar heat gain coefficient
- Local stone and finishes reduce transportation emissions and support regional craftsmanship
Lessons for Building Professionals
The Prestige University campus building offers several lessons applicable to institutional and educational building projects worldwide:
- Stepped roof configurations can transform an unused building surface into a high-value amenity without increasing the building footprint
- Passive design strategies rooted in vernacular architecture can achieve measurable energy savings when integrated from the earliest design stages
- The diagonal sectional organization provides an effective way to separate public and private functions while maintaining visual connectivity
- Cultural design precedents—in this case, the stepwell—can inspire contemporary building forms that resonate with local identity
- Accessible green roofs on stepped platforms create social interaction spaces that support student well-being and campus life
Building professionals designing educational facilities should consider how stepped sectional strategies, passive environmental control, and culturally rooted design can work together to produce buildings that perform well thermally, support their users socially, and contribute to the architectural identity of the campus.