Thirunerur Residence

Planned around light and air, then given a form

The house is organised so that daylight and cross-ventilation reach the rooms that are lived in most, with deep overhangs and screening handling the harsher part of the day. Those decisions were settled before the elevation was drawn — the form of the house follows from them rather than the other way round.

Inside

The interior carries the same logic through. A double-height living volume sits at the centre of the plan, with the stair, the pooja and the dining room reading off it rather than being closed away behind doors — so light borrowed at the top of the house reaches the ground floor, and the family can see and hear across it. Timber screens and fluted glass do the separating where separation is needed, without shutting the volume down.

Materials were picked to age well in the local climate rather than to photograph well on handover day: stone and black marble where the house takes wear, timber for the screens and ceilings, plaster everywhere else.