Not Your Average Architect: Sonia Sarangi Designs Homes with Heart, Heritage and Purpose
Words by Romayne Perera
“There are few words more laden with meaning as the word home; particularly if you are an immigrant.” – Sonia Sarangi
Sit with this. Without doubt, it’s a contemplation we have all experienced time and time again.
It’s more potent when the words are attributable to one of the few senior South Asian architects in Australia, whose passion and profession is centered around the home, which for her is “the literal container for our lives, memories, and a mirror of one’s inner self.”
Meet Sonia Sarangi, architect, co-Founder of andever, NFP board director, sessional staff at Melbourne School of Design, advocate, mentor, panelist and mum-of-two. Sonia was also an Australian South Asian centre Stellar Award Finalist in the STEM category for her advocacy in design and mentorship of women of colour.
Born and raised in Dubai to South Asian parents, Sonia can pinpoint the moment that led to her career choice. Observant of spaces around her throughout childhood, her curiosity was often piqued by a mere glimpse at a sliver of a space. During a visit to a friend’s home, she stumbled upon her friend’s mum drawing and creating spaces. This was her introduction to architecture as a profession. With a “brain wired for spaces from the beginning,” there was no looking back.
Having completed a Bachelor of Arts (Architecture) Hons. at National University of Singapore and Master of Architecture at University of Melbourne, Sonia has over 18 years of industry experience. In 2014, Sonia co-founded andever, an award-winning architectural practice, renowned for its innovative and robust designs.
Establishing herself in an industry steeped in “centuries of erasure and decades of systemic bias” of women, let alone women of colour, has been “incredible and incredibly challenging” for Sonia. Concerned that the profession “seems to be very resistant to new ways of seeing the world,” Sonia champions the power of lived experiences.
She is a staunch advocate of the fact that embracing the complexity of diverse groups and their lived experience is where innovation lies. Take for example, the tenets of South Asian design, which elevates the natural movement of air through space and celebrates the robustness and rawness of letting a material be itself, without any masking.
Leveraging her South Asian roots to influence contemporary architectural practices, Sonia is knocking down metaphorical walls as an authority on cultural awareness and diversity in design thinking for multicultural homes, to ensure the industry is making architecture for everyone.
Citing Jungian teachings of the house as a metaphor for the psyche, Sonia goes on to explain that architecture is thereby an expression of identity, with “the act of home-making helping people integrate their inner and outer selves”. As a migrant herself, Sonia understands the daily dialogue between our inner and outer persona and the critical need to embrace more of ourselves in the safe space that is our home; “home should be the one space you do feel at ease, especially when we don’t always feel safe in other spaces.” She acknowledges that migrants often disconnect with housing because having the bandwidth to question something as tangible as housing, in amongst every other consideration of the relocation process, is rare.
That’s why Sonia has made it her mission to reclaim and advance South Asian design heritage in all its glorious complexity. Rather than the monolith we are often seen as, Sonia wants to reclaim complexity, like other immigrant heritages, for example Italian, of which most people can now easily identify regional characteristics. “South Asian homes are so good at being modest but incredibly rich spatially and more people need to understand that.”
Part of this reclamation is her advice to the individual to focus on what brings joy, how your body occupies a space, what rituals you want to practice and to connect to memory and identity.
In addition to her professional endeavors, Sonia shares her knowledge as a sessional tutor at the Melbourne School of Design. She is passionate about nurturing the next generation of architects, emphasising the importance of cultural awareness, contemporary Asian architecture and critical thinking in design education.
This is important to Sonia because, as is the case across many industries, making it past the first role and into leadership has been her biggest career battle. Diverse groups are often seen as technically capable but experience gate-keeping around leadership, creativity and strategic-thinking. Sonia’s advice to the industry is to “stop the exhausting conversation around meritocracy and focus on active allyship”; and her advice to diverse individuals is to commit to the belief that “we are more than just the doers; we can also be change-makers”
Sonia’s journey to becoming a prominent figure in Melbourne’s architectural scene is a testament to how the power of honouring one’s heritage can lead to innovative and meaningful influence and outputs.
Couple this with an upbringing in a collectivist society, which despite its pitfalls, deeply guides her approach to architecture and leadership, which is a focus on the widest impact for the largest group of people. Through her directorial role at andever and active involvement in various architectural initiatives, Sonia continues to enrich as many different lives as possible, via advocacy, mentoring, and contribution to industry.
To end as we started, contemplate Sonia’s assessment that “the most rewarding project…is always the next one.”
Delve into Sonia’s fascinating and important world of architectural design and its influence and impact on us as individuals and a society.
Discover more about Sonia Sarangi.:
LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/sonia-sarangi-7a608b99
Website: www.andever.com.au
Read: Sonia’s piece on Reclaiming Culture in Home Design
Listen: An interview with Sonia reflecting on her roots and career
This series of member profiles is supported by Victorian Government through Business Victoria
This was the first time in my life (and in my mother’s, as she confirmed) that I had seen the story of a Tamil woman in Australia told on a stage. When we don’t put these stories on our stages, we don’t just close a door on the future; we decide these aren’t Australian stories, and the people in them aren’t quite Australian either.
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