Dream Home, Vadodara

Project Name: Dream Home, Vadodara
Architectural Group: SPIRIT
Architects/Designers: Shailesh Veera, Meetali Kamath
Client: Mr. Jayendra Shah
Project Location: Vadodara, Gujarat, India
Project Area: 7000 sq.ft
Built Up Area: 6500 sq.ft
Project Type: Residential
Project Completion: 2009
Image Courtesy: SPIRIT
Text: SPIRIT

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his house was designed to realize the lifelong dream home for an industrialist with multiple businesses. It is created out of the belief in the transcendent possibility of a profoundly “humane architecture” that contributes to the lives of its inhabitants physically, emotionally and functionally. Nothing in our existence has the potential to improve our life more than by living in great architecture.

The inspiration came from jazz great Charles Mingus who said:

[quote style=”1″]Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.[/quote]

The design of the house with its complex asymmetrical curves at multiple levels required a thorough understanding of geometry, structure and construction. Its unique curvilinear structure symbolizes the flow of life – smooth, free, with its highs and lows, ebbs and crests.

The challenge was to visualize the complete construction process right in the beginning and prepare detail drawings accordingly.  Six months of refining the geometry and discussions with the structural engineer and contractor ultimately led to the creation of a structure that seems effortless. The idea was to create a timeless kind of space that revitalizes and enhances the life of its inhabitants.

Instead of concentrating on historic detailing and intellectualized rationales, we focus on the client’s feelings about space and shelter and work to incorporate these emotions into our designs. The spaces designed by us seek to bring out feelings of shelter and joy from people inhabiting them. Shelter is that warm, enveloping nurturing feeling that is so absent from new buildings today.

The curvilinear spaces seem to embrace and assure, making secure and comfortable spaces. There is a point of release, a freeing of spirit in the same space.

Understanding the total picture in order to achieve total harmony in the designs is essential in order to conceive the whole idea. Following this idea through the whole design process, so that it is reflected in even the smallest details achieves this harmony.

The design evolved in an organic way, much the same as an embryo. It begins as an undifferentiated mass of feelings and impressions, and gradually became more focused and specific idea. Developing an idea in this manner is a process of designing from inside out. The exterior of the house reflects the function of the interior. A rough approximation of our design process could be achieved if you were to experience the building first from the inside.

The house has an expansive feel, not limited by its restrictive site. Imagine being blindfolded and placed in the middle of the living room before the blindfold is taken off. Now, first experiencing the center of the living room and gradually come to understand the design until reaching the furthest areas of the interior you had discovered all of it.

Finally, after fully comprehending the whole interior, you move outside and begin to discover how it relates to the interior. The logic of the exterior would become readily apparent now. Experiencing the house in this manner, your journey happens in somewhat the same manner as we did – from inside out.

Entering this house can be a dramatic magnificent experience and also introspective, quiet, peaceful experience. One never wants to leave, for this is a heavenly feeling.