Introduction: SACHIN PRABHAT MUJUMDAR, Partner at Architects United, has been practising architecture for over 35 years joining a firm founded in 1961 straight out of Amravati University, and never leaving. His work spans industrial facilities, healthcare campuses, and everything in between, with projects delivered across India and the UAE. In this conversation with SSMB, he reflects on steel’s evolving role in industrial and healthcare architecture, the lessons that only a construction site can teach, and why designing for the future means building in the capacity to change.
You have been with Architects United since 1989, joining a firm that started in 1961. How has your approach to steel as a structural choice evolved over more than three decades?
The journey of steel in industrial architecture in India is quite interesting. It started with Northlight structures and has now arrived at pre-engineered buildings. That in itself is a good journey. But what I feel more strongly about is not just how steel has evolved as a system, but how to use it, how to go beyond simply constructing a shade and create something more considered and more interesting. That is where my thinking has shifted over the years.
You designed a facility for Ebersendai, a company whose own business is structural steel fabrication. What was it like designing for a client who understands steel at that level of technical depth?
It was a genuinely interesting experience. Ebersendai has more than 2,000 design engineers. They design steel structures all over the world in projects in Mumbai, in Singapore. So when I visited their corporate office to present, I asked them that they are experts in steel structures, why do they want me? Their answer was immediate. They said, a doctor cannot perform an operation on himself. That was it. That was the answer, and we went ahead and built the project together.
“Steel’s future adaptability is one of its most undervalued advantages.”
Hospitals like Dinanath Mangeshkar, a thousand-bed facility with 16 operation theatres, have very different structural demands than a factory. Where does steel play a critical role inside a hospital that most people would not expect?
This project began around 2007 to 2008, as an expansion next to an existing 200-bed hospital, scaling up to nearly 900 additional beds. From the outset, we considered steel for the new building. At that stage, however, the supporting ecosystem in Pune was not yet in place, vendors were limited and crane availability for erection was a genuine constraint. We ultimately proceeded with a different structural approach for that project. But the case for steel in hospitals remains strong. It supports faster construction, causes far less disturbance to adjoining operational areas, and offers the same spatial flexibility it brings to any complex building.
What is one steel-related decision on a hospital project that, if got wrong, could directly affect patient safety?
Fire protection. If a steel building is not correctly protected from fire, it becomes a serious vulnerability particularly in high-rise construction. There are two accidents that make this point clear. In the September 11 attacks, a plane struck a steel building and the entire structure came down as fire spread rapidly through the frame. In contrast, a similar accident near Ahmedabad involved a concrete building of comparable scale. The fire was contained largely to the affected floor, and the floors below remained intact. That difference is not incidental. It is structural. Specifying and executing fire protection correctly in a steel building is not optional, it is the decision that everything else depends on.
You have delivered projects across India and the UAE. Have you noticed real differences in how steel is trusted and used between Indian and international projects?
Steel is far more widely used in international projects, though that is changing in India as well. The shift is most visible in the larger cities like Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai where steel has become a genuine mainstream choice. In smaller cities, however, the material is still used more selectively. The drivers are consistent wherever you go: faster construction, easier execution. As those pressures intensify across more Indian cities, steel will follow.
“As the ecosystem around steel continues to mature across Indian cities, its role in healthcare construction is only going to grow.”
Among your industrial or healthcare projects, is there one where steel solved a problem that concrete simply could not?
Future modification. In a steel building, if you need to add floors, increase loading capacity, change crane loads, or add hanging loads to the roof, it is entirely achievable provided the design anticipates it from the beginning. If you use the correct thickness of steel plate and build in provision for future modification at the concept stage, the building can be adapted with relative ease by adding members. In a concrete building, that kind of change is far more difficult, often impossible without significant disruption. That adaptability is one of steel’s most undervalued advantages.
For young architects entering industrial or healthcare design today, what is the one steel-related lesson you had to learn on site that nobody taught you in architecture school?
Design for the future from day one. There is a common assumption particularly around industrial steel buildings that once a structure is built, the loading on the columns or roof cannot be changed. Pre-engineered building vendors sometimes reinforce this thinking. But it is not true, if you plan correctly. If you anticipate future crane loads, roof loads, or hanging loads at the concept stage, and specify the right steel thickness accordingly, the building can be adapted over time. Ownership of that foresight is something no school teaches you. You learn it on site, project by project.
“If future loads are anticipated at the concept stage and specified correctly, the building can be adapted over time.”
