British Colonial

The Empire grows. From the Caribbean to India, from Cape Town to Singapore, the British build offices, churches, residences and clubs. The drawings come from home. The weather doesn't.

So the style has to adapt. Walls get thicker, ceilings higher, windows are shielded by shutters and louvres. Around the house runs a deep veranda – a room without walls, where you can sit outside without standing in the sun. The floor is lifted off the ground, against damp and for the air.

In Kolkata, St. John's Church is finished in 1787, modelled on St Martin-in-the-Fields in London. The columns, the pediment and the spire are English. The climate is not.

A word travels home too. Bungalow comes from bangla – a house in the Bengal style. Low, with a veranda all round. The British take the house across the Empire, and then to England and America.

When the heat becomes too much, officials move up into the hills. In hill stations such as Ooty and Shimla, stone houses and villas go up that look as if they belong in Surrey. In Ooty, John Sullivan begins building Stone House in 1822, the first house of its kind in the town. The locals call it Kal Bangala – the stone bungalow.

In the late 19th century colonial style becomes more festive. In Singapore, Raffles Hotel opens in 1887, and the main building of 1899 becomes a symbol of the whole era.

Georgian architecture. The façade is often the same. The difference is the climate: the colonial house has verandas, shutters and high rooms that a house in London never needs.

Palladianism. Columns and symmetry go back to Palladio. But colonial style is practical first – shade comes before proportion.