Empire Building: The Construction of British India: 1690–1860

Empire Building is a new account of the East India Company's impact on India, focusing on how it changed the subcontinent's built environment in the context of defence, urbanisation and infrastructural development.

Rosie Llewellyn-Jones examines these initiatives through a lens of 'political building' (using Indian contractors and labourers). Railways, docks, municipal buildings, Freemasons' lodges, hotels, racecourses, barracks, cemeteries, statues and canals-everything the British erected made a political statement, even if unconsciously. Hence this book is concerned less with architectural styles, more with subtle infiltration into the minds of those who saw and used these structures. It assesses, in turn, Indian responses to the changing landscape. Indians often reacted favourably to new manufacturing technologies from Britain, such as minting and gunpowder, while the British learnt from and adapted local methods.