The
long and narrow site of the Ramachandran house helps to define the
nature of the spaces and also the choice of construction materials.
Working with an overall plot width of 22.5 feet, this layout tries to
maximise every possible inch in this shorter direction. The narrow
site posed a challenge in finding ways of bringing together the
living spaces in anything other than a linear manner. This is solved
by drawing the entrance towards the middle of the site and angling
the walls to create wider spaces on the outside. The angled walls set
up dynamic inter-relationships on the inside and influence the
outside. The character of the house emerges from the unconventional
spaces formed between inside and outside space.Natural
Teakwood furniture brings in warmth while working in contrast to the
exposed concrete and cement finishes visible on the outside and
selectively on the inside. The floors are of natural stone on the
public spaces of the ground floor, a grey green Kotah and yellow
Jaiselmer stone. The first floor is entirely a hand trowel finished
cement floor laid within a grid of timber strips, a dying art in the
country.