Exterior design of townhouse and their extension/reconstruction process with regard to eaves types in a World Cultural Heritage site of a Nepali city

Abstract

The paper deals with the exterior design of townhouses both inside and outside the Historic Monument Zone in the eastern part of Bhaktapur of Kathmandu Valley inscribed on the World Cultural Heritage List in 1979. This paper consists of following steps. First, the authors compose the original format of the survey sheet for Nepali townhouses. Second, the paper hypothesizes that a townhouse either experienced an extension of the upper floors or was totally reconstructed in the course of time. The authors propose “eaves types” as the key idea in this hypothesis. The result of the exterior design survey is primarily compared between inside and outside the Historic Monument Zone of the World Cultural Heritage site. Further comparison among eaves group or eaves types is done. Finally, eaves types are confirmed with the floor extension/reconstruction period demarcated by past devastating earthquakes. The result of the comparison again very well explained the characteristics of each eaves type.