Architectural Project is a capstone project of the five-year course in undergraduate education in architecture and it gives an opportunity for the students to demonstrate the application of the learning in various subjects in the course. Choice of the topic of project is generally left to the student. The article investigates the reasons for the choice of the project. Initial exploratory qualitative interviews with the project guides, senior teachers and few students led to identification of various reasons for choosing a topic. A structured interview schedule was prepared based upon the findings of the exploratory interviews. The research was carried out in sampled institutes affiliated to the Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, by interviewing seventy-four students. The predominant reasons of topic selection were: topic with strong social/contemporary relevance, projects offering flexibility and freedom for experimenting with form. Almost 58 percent of the projects fell in the category of commercial and institutional buildings. While sports buildings were the least chosen topic. Apart from shedding light on to the students' choice of projects and reasons behind it, the findings bring forth the hesitance of students to choose projects with intense functional requirements such as the hospitals and services-oriented projects. These areas need attention from the point of view of teaching. © 2021 Common Ground Research Networks, Abhijit Natu, All Rights Reserved.
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