ABSTRACT
The cold, high and dry Tibetan Plateau in northern India comprising of Ladakh, Spiti and Zanskar represents a unique geographical region, which marked by extremes of climate and topography is largely devoid of vegetation, usable construction material, population and connect with rest of the world. These vagaries of nature and seclusion have forced communities to develop their own ways for sustenance which can be well understood by studying the built fabric—starting from site selection, orientation and layout to the much finer details, all of which seems to serve specific purposes. Mud being abundantly available is used for constructing all the major building components like walls, roof, floor, plaster, ornamentation, etc. This paper attempts to understand the evolution of residential built forms in response to extreme conditions, document the recent transformations and probe into reasons behind them, their implications on performance of built environment and sustainability of these communities.
