The street converges on the ground as cars line its linearity. House upon house, balcony upon balcony directs the edges in parallel geometry that only define the axis.
Sitting in the midst of this is Tapovan. The architecture is that of a tree. It reaches for the sky and yet remains firmly rooted to its earth. Its ground a bed rock of stone. Its sky blue laden with birds.
A monument blinks in the distance as the frames of sky are filtered by the concrete louvers of the courtyard. Terraces and balconies step out to touch the open. Some planar and some gingerly lean on the ledges of the green shrubs. Bringing the earth and sky together. The home rises. Vertical surfaces of Dholpur and glass build volumes hollowed by a courtyard. Not traditional, not modern but cyclical. Like a tree it inhabits, nurtures and then transpires. The home is sanctuary more than shelter, calm and yet engaging in its shade, both bark and branch in its sense driven sensibility. The boundaries of the 635 square yard plot extend into the green acres of park in the rear. Trees that share light in hues of green give a new nomenclature to the rocky earth… a Tapovan. Meditative silence envelopes the shade. Is this an island? Or one which seeks to be? The layers of the house peel as one enters its doors. It’s open, wide spaces in flexible patterns mirror the light that filters through the trees. Radha and Krishna dance beneath the shaded leaves of a mango tree. A winding stair, a lift well leads to the doors of the duplex. The journey broken by horizontal beams of light that change with the course of the west sun. Stone and steel on its edifice closes itself to the street. Not shunning the hum drum of south Delhi, but perhaps seeking to introvert itself to capture privacy and then cradle it in the heart of its hollow. It attempts to create a pause…a comma and not a full stop. Holding its breath…waiting to exhale into the vast parklands that abut the property. This sanctuary seeks not to conserve but to renew, to enter, to shelter and then recharge with release of exuberance. The monument, the street, the home, the courtyard, the park, the sky all combine in a singular poetic moment… absorbing and liberating under the shade of a tree.
