A tale of three storeys

What does it take to design a home for a business family of three generations, spread over three levels in a Mumbai multi-storey?

In Mumbai, as in other big cities, the real estate market today urges the conversion of older bungalows into multi-storey apartments. The bungalow owners sometimes get the penthouse for themselves, in the new building built on their land. Some can even continue experiencing the joys and challenges of multi-level living, like the business family in this three-level home designed by architect Shilpa Gore-Shah.

THREE FLOORS, THREE GENERATIONS
The family approached Gore-Shah, who runs the architecture and design partnership S+PS with husband Pinkish Shah in Mumbai, to design a home in the top three storeys of a 10-storey building that was being built where their family bungalow had been. The family had an unusual requirement for the ‘triplex’ apartment. It had to house three generations, with two presiding grandfathers who are cousins! The children and grandchildren of each are the two remaining generations. The granddaughters are all married and live elsewhere, and one bachelor grandson stays in the house.

 

Gore-Shah’s challenge was twofold. First, she had to find a way of providing a sense of privacy for the individuals and couples, while also forging the sense of a shared home. Second, she felt she needed to recreate the sense of living in a bungalow, which the family had enjoyed for years.

CONNECTING THE LEVELS
At the core of the modern bungalow experience are two things: the freedom to walk out into the patio or garden from the living space, and the sense of living across two or more floors. Both factors combine to create an experience that is richer than that of a boxed-in apartment with uniform floor and ceiling levels.

To achieve the bungalow feel, Gore-Shah cut up and shuffled the typical stack of three floors planned for this 6,000 sq ft house in the air, and rearranged spaces horizontally to create ‘gaps’ in the form of terraces. A stepped profile has emerged for the three storeys, with the lowest of the three storeys (the eighth floor) covering the full footprint of the building, and the middle floor having a terrace space open at its centre. The upper floor steps back further, with two private terraces for bedrooms on the uppermost floor overlooking the living room terrace on the intermediate floor. Gore-Shah and the family decided to sacrifice about 200 sq ft of allowable built-up area for the terraces.

The middle floor was conceived as the entry level, with shared and public functions, while private spaces are on the floors above and below. An internal staircase and private elevator connect all three floors.

The terrace on the middle floor connects the spacious living area with the dining space. Also on this floor are the kitchen, a meeting room-cum-office, and a room where one of the daughters-in-law runs her coaching class. The lower floor houses the bedroom suites for each grandfather, two guest bedrooms and the grandson’s room. The upper floor, meanwhile, houses each of the two couples in a bedroom suite opening onto a private terrace. An internal staircase connects the three floors, with its external glass wall flooding the passage on each floor with light.

DIFFERENT MATERIALS AND COLOURS
Gore-Shah pays attention to details, responding to challenge with innovation. The design balances a wide range of materials, textures, and details. Some constants — straight lines, large openings, white walls and wood veneer — anchor what would otherwise have been a dizzying variety of visual events.

There is always more than one reason for every choice, and the supporting reason is either functional or associational. Thus, the stone cladding for the corridor and end walls provides a durable finish not easily damaged by hand-stains, while also recalling the traditional architecture of Gujarat, which is where the family is from. Sculpted relief panels (with temple carvings and inscriptions) sprinkled across a similarly clad wall of the living room heighten this connection.

In an upper bedroom, Gore-Shah takes her cue from the Kerala connection of one of the daughters-in-law. The room is largely in black and wood. A customised four-poster in brass and wood sits quietly upon a river-washed black granite floor. Adjustable wooden louvres in the terrace window — reinterpreting the traditional detail — help control the amount of light entering the room.

DESIGN AND PERSONALISATION: WHOSE HOME IS IT?
The designer’s controlling presence is evident throughout the house. While this is an achievement for the designer, most interior spaces arranged by the dwellers themselves express the personalities of the dwellers. If a home is completely designed by a professional designer, down to the last switch, how does the family mark its identity upon the space?

Gore-Shah acknowledges the issue. “That problem is part of the task of interior design,” she says. “Clients are happiest when all the functional and aesthetic complexities of design are taken care of by architects. This often means that they would like you to be involved in choosing every little thing like a bedspread or a painting. Ideally, they should be able to do that themselves, as a way of completing the design themselves. However, their hesitation is understandable, since it takes much skill and training to make choices that fit the theme.”

Seen in this light, perhaps, the profusion of different visual sensations in Gore-Shah’s triplex may well be good. It makes space for the sensibility of the dweller. It can absorb any dissonances that might creep in, since a single combination or sensation does not hold the composition together.