Green groundscraper

AHMEDABAD: In a rapidly expanding city, insensitive glass facades spring up at every corner and neighbourhood, competing with each other to capture the skyline. However, two newly completed homes - meant for developer duo Amogh Joshi and Bhargav Kansara - turn away from this concrete madness, finding respite in a green design.
The 1,200 square yard space on which the two adjacent structures are built is a part of one of the many high-end, low-rise residential plotted developments that dot the area.It is situated on the suburban fringe surrounded by "huge volumes of builds and small patches of green".
The houses responded to the skyscraping conventionality by sinking into the ground, with their introverted design opening up a common green courtyard. The living and dining spaces of both the homes are on the ground level, and the more private spaces of bedrooms go below the ground but around the court. Like conjoined twins, the houses are connected on the ground level by a verandah, built like a wooden deck over the green court.
All masonry construction of the houses uses lime mortar, lime plaster and lime fly ash bricks. "The revival of lime as a viable material in masonry work for buildings is essential," say architect Uday Andhare, who along with Mausami, runs Indigo Architects.
"Most of the vernacular construction in this part of the country used lime. Concrete's life deteriorates after, say, 50 years but lime begins to live after 50," says Uday. "On reacting with atmosphere, it has the quality to turn into limestone. Thermal comfort and durability of lime-plastered walls is far superior to that provided by regular cement construction." And of course we realize this, as within the lime walls of the house the temperature is well below what the sweltering heat records outside.
The lime plaster also preserves the quality of "75,000 litres of rain water" which is stored by water harvesting methods. The water can be used around the year for drinking and cooking.
"The beauty in the simple hand-wrought textures of lime is a soothing antidote to all the ultra-fine, machine-finished synthetic surfaces that surround us," says Mausami. "Also, it is important that we cause the least harm to the ecosystem."
Thus many local varieties of plants like kadam, peepal, gulmohar, and figs dot the compound. It is not too difficult to imagine this abode submerged within the canopy of green in a few years. Most of the fig varieties are inviting for the birds. "A home grows with time and its inhabitants. As architects, what we create is a framework for it to grow," adds Mausami.
Aha Moment
In the long shadows of evening or in the morning, as the family retires in the scooped-out 'sunken' court for conversations and coffee, the only view on offer is the green that surrounds the house. The sunken court is the family's way of creating privacy over new concepts of building 'green walls'. When they look out from their concrete balconies, neighbours too can enjoy the dazzle of this green abode.