Vastu

Vastu introduced a new aesthetic into the city’s skyline. The initial reaction to this dramatic yet novel design was disbelief. Its arrogant and strange sense of expression is especially ardent in its profile. The capsule like form of the building invokes metaphors like one half of a bullet split down the middle, among many others. The perforated domed roof further accentuates its unconventional rhetoric. The peculiar design was originally conceptualised as a triangular structure but the owner’s spiritual advisor believed that the shape was inauspicious, so it evolved to its present form. The residential block houses a triplex apartment crowning the building, below which are 5 duplex apartments. Each apartment boasts of a panoramic sea view and consists of 3 bedrooms, a double height living room, dining area, kitchen, a semicircular deck, storeroom and servant’s room. Its semicircular cantilevered balconies have curved pipe railings embedded into the principal columns of the structure and are lined with flowerbeds. A freestanding, prefabricated steel staircase clad in marble connects the two levels of each duplex apartment. The shell dome crown cut into half is perforated with open-to-sky slits and houses the terrace garden. Vastu is also significant for its use of ‘double walls’ that not only enabled the creation of the necessary form and modulations on the surface, but also simultaneously acted as protection against the harsh monsoons and summers. This system added value in the commercial sense as it delivered larger saleable space that was created due to reduced width of the external walls.