1,350 sq.ft. Compact Row House in Ahmedabad, by Studio Saransh

HS House is a family home that is located in a gated community in a central location in Ahmedabad. It was an existing row house which was quite old and was not aging very well. So the clients wanted to build a new house which was more modern, which incorporated services in a better manner. And they just wanted to add one more space which was like a more multi-purpose kind of a space where they could have a home theatre or a gym or something like that. The existing house had three bedrooms along with a living space and a dining space and a kitchen. They did believe in Vastu and they wanted certain principles to be accommodated but they were open-minded as to the restrictions of the site as well and understood how we could create a balance between both aspects. So this site is located in a gated community and the road is pretty narrow. There are two houses right next to it with common walls and this deep narrow plot of land was where we had to rebuild the existing house. Structurally this was difficult because the two common walls that were there housed the entire structure of the house. So we had to sort of break the beams in the middle while there were people living on both sides. Then we built new walls which were independent of the structures around and that is how this house got built. There was this again deep plot. The only way light and wind could come in was from these two edges which were the shorter edges and that would not suffice for this big floor plate. So what we did was we sort of divided this project into two buildings. One in the north and one in the south and what remained in the middle became a central courtyard which provided light and ventilation to both these buildings. We sort of staggered these two buildings in their height. There was a height restriction on the roadside and we could maintain that while at the back edge not only did we go higher but we accommodated a basement space underneath and we didn't have to dig too much due to the water tables there. While doing this we also realized that this provided us with an opportunity to sort of connect these split levels in a very dynamic manner. So on the ground floor we recessed the building inside so that we could create parking spaces in front. This was covered by the upper floor such that a lot of it was saved from sunlight. The only level inside the house that is at ground level is the foyer from where directly you climb up for around 1.2 meters and that is when the courtyard reveals itself to you. That's the first thing that everyone sees when they enter. The only functional space on this floor is the living space where they entertain guests. There's also a back garden here so when there are get-togethers people can sort of roam around in between these two gardens. There's also a small powdered room here, a storage space and then there is the main staircase. Once they reach this dining level they see an open floor plan of the main kitchen platform as well as the dining table. There's also a very large balcony here that provides a space for them to have their morning coffee and then there is a small bridge with just four steps that sort of connects to that split level which accommodates the first bedroom of the house. All these bedrooms in the house have an attached bath and this bedroom specifically has a sort of cantilevered jaruka space which is glass on all three sides and this bedroom is used by the parents so that space sort of gives them a place to just relax through the day and because it's the north side it doesn't really get that hot. From there one can then climb further up to what is the master bedroom which is pretty similar in size to the other bedroom and then again another bridge sort of connects to the opposite side where there's the last bedroom which currently is just a guest bedroom. Both of these bedrooms have small balconies and from the master bedroom balcony one can sort of look down onto the dining balcony and it creates a nice moment of interaction there. When one goes up there is the first level of the terrace which they wanted a space where they could just sit out because otherwise this is a very inward house and this was a place where they could sort of go out. There's a small space to put plants in the front and then uses that bridge again and goes to the back terrace which is generally just services and solar panels and so on. The courtyard is a very important part of this house. At the top there is glass panelling which is done consciously to make it hotter in the summers. What that does is the air around also becomes hotter and hotter and the idea was to give larger openings on the lower levels to sort of suck cold air in and then the hot air could sort of open out from very small windows given at the top and create this whole draft. So we use the laminated glass which would not break easily and also the metal grid is supposed to sort of reduce the size of each individual opening such that it would be very difficult to enter. So this metal cage what we did was the sides of it have been made by using individual small glasses whereas at the top we've used one full plane of glass which also is laminated but in that laminated two pieces of glass the top glass is reflective. So it does get heated but it doesn't let that much sunlight enter as well. In this central light well we've used eight paper lanterns which of course are very light so whenever there is the draft inside the house the lanterns sort of sway and it creates this nice dynamic environment. They are kind of a spiral going up and as there is no slab on the top we could only hang them from certain points of the metal cage and then to position them what we did was we sort of just pull them to certain parts from the different split level slab. All these lanterns were somewhere close either near a staircase or near the passage so that whenever the bulb sort of just went out it could easily be replaced. The other important feature of the house is the exposed concrete. We thought of creating this shell in itself which not only just stands in itself but sort of appears to have been fit between two existing blocks and it continues on till the length of the entire house. So structurally these two parallel walls make the whole house stand. We embrace this concrete structure and sort of let it be exposed. Not only that we added a couple of small walls here and there which then we also even though they were not structural let them be exposed concrete walls. So there were multiple manners in which we used concrete in this house. One of course is the lower levels if one sees it is a darker more dense concrete. Those are actually precast panels. They have a wooden grain texture to it. From the first level onwards we go to a normal plywood concrete which is the normal shuttering that one sees. This stark difference between these two gives this lower level a more sort of heavy feeling. So as one enters and looks up you sort of feel the lightness of the building. Inside the bedrooms is where we tried various patterns and some of them were cast with the plywood shuttering and some of them were rendered on later. And in these patterns is where we have sort of inlaid brass to accentuate the design of these different kinds of patterns. In the entire house the public spaces have a Kota stone flooring and the private spaces have a laminated wooden flooring. The Kota stone flooring outside changes. So in used spaces the flooring pattern pauses. It becomes simpler. There is a normal grid. And then there are the movement spaces where the pattern becomes dense and it becomes dynamic. Sort of leads you to where you need to go, gives you directionality. We had conceptualized this staircase as a thin metal folded plate which sort of connects these two concrete blocks. And because the span was long structurally it was a little difficult to achieve. So what we did was the handrail of this staircase is what became the beam that sort of suspends the entire staircase from it. We put wooden treads on top. That sort of gave it a little softness which the entire courtyard needed. And along with that there was a central garden. So that garden and these wooden steps and the black staircase is a place where everyone can sort of interact throughout the house. On this first level there are two gardens. The one behind sort of this non-existent wall sort of and makes you look inward. And then there is the central court garden which is a tall landscaped area which sort of covers this entire span of the light well. So visually when you are climbing the staircase the aim is that those plants will sort of grow and you would be able to touch them at different levels. So these are some of the materials that were used in the project. This was the precast concrete panel. We started it by sort of wanting to reduce the amount of wood that was used in the shuttering. We created a rubber mold by using one plate of wood. And then we used that mold to create around 150 panels. So we reduced wood usage a lot. At the same time what it allowed us to do was create a sort of flat pigmented color which in situ is a little difficult to achieve and there can be some undulations that form. This is the tread of the black staircase. This is reclaimed from the old city of Ahmedabad and then sort of joined together. And this is of course an example of the leather finished kota stone that is used in the flooring. I touched elements of passive design, structural complexities, looking at a specific material in multiple manners. One doesn't need to design every nook and corner and it is the entire atmosphere or the vibe of the space that achieves that. Music