Bawa’s architectural career began at the end of 1957 when, at the age of thirty-eight, he returned to Ceylon after completing his studies at the Architectural Association (the A.A.) in London and became a partner in the near moribund firm of Edwards Reid and Begg. The practice occupied offices in the Colombo Fort. His fellow partners were Jimmy Nilgiria and Valentine Gunasekera and early collaborators included Turner Wickremasinghe and Nihal Amerasinghe. At the end of 1958 he recruited Danish architect Ulrik Plesner who worked as his close associate until the end of 1966.
The early buildings with which Bawa and Plesner were associated – such as the Ekala Industrial Estate and the Bishop’s College Classroom Block - followed the precepts of Tropical Modernism that had been promoted at the A.A. by the likes of Maxwell Fry and Jane Drew. After 1961, however, they adopted a more regionalist approach which took its inspiration from traditional typologies and technologies – as was evident in their designs for the Ena de Silva House, the Bandarawela Chapel and the Polontalawa Bungalow.