Excerpt: Villa Prakriti by unTAG Architecture and Interiors is a biophilic mountain dwelling that celebrates the profound connection between humans and nature. Rooted in the idea of ‘Prakriti,’ the residence seeks not to mimic nature but to live in its likeness, blending quietly into the Sahyadri landscape. It grows around a lone mango tree, embracing the terrain with humility, creating a dwelling that listens, breathes, and coexists with its surroundings.
Project Description
[Text as submitted by architect] Prakriti, in Sanskrit infers to “mother nature” Cradled amidst the undulating folds of India’s Sahyadri mountains, overlooking the Mukhane dam waters, Prakriti, is a quaint four bedroom, 4500 sq. ft. biophilic farm home that celebrates and accentuates the profound connect between humans and nature. This home seeks not to mimic nature, but to live in its likeness — to be adaptive, procreative, rooted, and generous. Prakriti wishes not to be a spectacle but a quiet participant in the landscape — a home that blends in, and disappears into its surroundings. A dwelling that embraces the natural setting – through form, material, orientation, and breath. In this forested sanctuary, architecture lends its ear before it speaks. It is not imposed on the land; it is rather discovered within it. This is architecture in its most elemental form, a way of listening, inhabiting, co-existing and ever evolving.
The first seed of thought was born right under the lone mango tree. Its position, quiet yet assertive, formed the instinctual nucleus — the axis mundi, around which the home weaves its story. The spatial configuration splits in two wings around this mango tree — one public, one private. Between them is not just circulation, but conversation: between light and shade, sound and silence, self and the surrounding wilderness. Just like the tree, the house grows outward in humility and strength, where the tree transforms itself into a living sculpture. Traversing the home on a contoured topography becomes an act of choreography, negotiating numerous levels, slowly unravelling spaces and distant vantages. The terrain is not seen as an obstacle to overcome, but a rhythm to follow. Instead of flattening the ground into terraces, the house treads gently along it — a minimal cut-fill philosophy respecting the natural gradient.
One enters the house not as scenery, but as presence. The home is accessed through a meandering entrance stair orchestrating a lyrical rise through a thicket of greens, subtly setting the tone for the spatial biophilia to unfold. The stair lands onto a brick-floored entrance canopy, dappled by the magical play of light and shadow through a bamboo pergola, greeted by the orchestrator himself, the lush green mango tree. The living is envisaged as a transient threshold connecting the front and the rear landscapes while poetically framing the Mango’s lower branches.
The Living opening to the South is protected by a 10’ deep verandah, terminating as a trapezoidal pool panoramically framing the distant Sahyadris. The defining element of the Living is the organic planter bed which effortlessly moulds into a built-in seat while transgressing indoors and outdoors. An elliptical skylight further accentuates the living experience welcoming filtered daylight. A central spiral stair, another defining feature of the living, born out of another planter bed with an earthy backdrop of bare-brick wall, leads you to the upper bedroom.
The other three bedrooms constituting the private wing, are straddled at three different levels, negotiating the existing contours through outdoor stairs, consistently interspersed with greens. At Prakriti, nature is not a mere backdrop, but the narrative itself. One can feel the forest breathing through the home through its multiple biophilic gestures, be it visual, olfactory or auditory. These green inserts are the off springs of this earthy home which bring an innate serenity into the space.
Designed with a deep climatic sensitivity, and solar passive design wisdom, rooted in the context, the home with two sloping roofs shades the harsh southwards sun through its verandahs and balconies, and brings in diffused light through its brick jalis. All habitable spaces are cross-ventilated, ensuring a year round thermal comfort to the occupants. Additionally, the traditional clay tile roofs ensure the escape of hot air.
Metaphorical to an earthy creature born from the Sahyadris’ fertile soil, the home with its terracotta hues, gives birth to the various green offspring. Brick — honest, textural, and timeless — is used extensively for walls and flooring, instilling warmth and tactility. Native cost-effective shahbad stone is laid in various forms and patterns throughout the home. The traditional Mangalore tile roof evokes the timeless qualities of regional building techniques, while the villa’s interiors maintain a warm, intimate atmosphere. Large, expansive windows invite abundant natural light and frame the breath-taking views of the surrounding landscape.
True sustainability lies not just in material choice, but in the economy of means. Every solution within the house — right from the massing of the overall house to the smaller portions of architectural detailing are conscious choices made to achieve an ecologically and economically sustainable design.
In its humble scale, responsive detailing, and deep reverence for site and season, this home offers an alternative lens — one where design becomes an act of empathy. The site’s architecture and landscape together blur the boundary between built and unbuilt, restoring ecological memory and inviting the forest to reclaim its continuity.
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