Excerpt: Jade, a residence by unTAG Architecture and Interiors, is a tropical modern dwelling with an ethnic rootedness and connection to nature. The three-story home draws inspiration from natural features, creating stepped terraces and balconies under lush green canopies that serve as key thresholds between indoors and outdoors. The design prioritizes privacy through an introverted plan, with a central courtyard serving as its inner respite.
Project Description
[Text as submitted by architect] Nestled in a gated community in Lonavala, India, JADE, is a cost-effective five-bedroom home nestled on a compact 3,200 sq.ft. site. Conceived as a retirement home for two sisters in their sixties, both ex-stewardesses with Air-India, the primary brief was a tropical modern dwelling with an ethnic rootedness, which ensured privacy on the tiny plot while being connected to nature. With a keen eye for art, having travelled the world while employed, the clients had gathered extensive exclusive artefacts, which awaited their place in the new home. This humble abode is a storybook of the fun journeys of these two women, a mini-museum of their art collection over 40 years.
The 3,200 sq.ft. home planning takes clues from the existing natural features, being carefully woven around five gigantic trees, which are its GREEN SOUL, also its guardians. That’s where the home derives its name, JADE. Being closely bounded by immediate bungalows on either side, the house necessitated privacy through an introverted plan, where a central courtyard became the inner respite.
A consciously planned three storey structure, the home recedes itself every tier. The intent was to avoid making the home feel overwhelming from the street, rather creating stepped terraces and balconies for sitting under the lush green canopies. The upper two bedrooms have been envisioned as glass pavilions with sloping roofs, to capitalize on the distant views of the Sahyadris. Each habitable space is layered with either a verandah, balcony or a terrace, so as to keep the internal spaces thermally comfortable. These transient spaces acting as key thresholds between the indoors and outdoors, eventually become the most lived spaces in the tropics.
The visual permeability achieved through careful use of fenestration, makes the home look spacious than actual, especially at the ground level. The external boundary wall crafted in local bricks adds a layer of privacy while becoming an immediate visual aspect. The stair is the essential tie between the two wings, wherein one overlooks the courtyard while one transcends. JADE is materialized as a balanced mix of white walls, bare bricks and the greens. Each room is being envisaged with a specific aesthetics, in consultation with stylists, also the clients, Reena and Neena, with their existing furnishings and artworks. Hues of terracotta, black & white, greys with filler slab ceilings lend a neutral backdrop for these clients’ collectibles to take precedence.
The home is climatically appropriated through passive solar strategies, ensuring thermal comfort to its inhabitants even in peak summers. The layered cross-ventilated spaces, with controlled openings and their mathematically calculated overhangs, ensure a pleasant habitat to its occupants throughout the year. An in-house post occupancy thermal monitoring being conducted by the architects, the home has performed exceptionally well, by keeping the inner shell cooler by at least 6 to 8˚ cooler in peak Indian summers. Being a collaborative journey between us and the clients, JADE is all about co-creating with habitants while co-existing with nature.
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