Kalavanam Residence

The clients are a young enterprising couple and their 8-year-old daughter. The lady of the house is a pop & Playback singer in the Telugu film industry and is an entrepreneur in beauty & fashion business. Her husband is also an entrepreneur and helms many businesses with her and on his own.

This project was a true collaboration! Since the owner is already very creatively inclined and has a strong liking for the ethnic and the traditional Indian look, we set about creating a space that would balance our sensibilities and hers to bring her vision to life! Art, as you can see all played a major role as we collected a lot of the pieces during the making of the project. Also, we stayed away from anything that was too straight lined.

A number of challenges arose right from structural elements to managing the whole show during lockdown, but nothing we couldn’t address and move on from! There were many structural changes as the space was essentially 2 apartments that we converted into a duplex. 2 X 4 bedroom apartments that we merged and made into one large 4 bedroom duplex.

Layers were the most important element of this ethnic inspired space. The idea to have a Duplex apartment in one of the most modern high-rise buildings in Hyderabad and blend in the client’s aesthetic seamlessly into sounds easy only while saying it 😊

The living area has multiple pieces of art from artists like the cool sculpture/ painting of the lady in the glasses by Jagadish Chinthala, the round paintings by Ramesh Gorjala and pieces from the clients own earlier collection. The piece de resistance is the 14’ length life size Tanjore painting in the Dining area specially commissioned for us and had to be hauled up by a crane 11 floors. Speaking of hauling, the dining table itself is a work of art with a blue concrete top and brass inlays with the lotus motif that reflects everywhere.

The Furniture partly from client’s old collection fused with some impeccably crafted pieces from the Colonial Collections and fabrics by Studio Orion just sets the right tone for the space while being offset by a gorgeous maroon traditional rug from Jaipur Rugs.

The railing is the feature that ties it all together and takes your eyes up the atrium to the Mezzanine where it is spotted by pillars and then ends up with the gorgeous ceiling that we worked on endlessly to the detail out with the client, artist Srinivas and craft designer, Krupanand Karthik. The Original inspiration for it was a Mangalore tiled roof that slowly evoked into this representation that ties the whole house together and even grounds it in its roots in a certain way.

Design Features

The bedrooms even though all speak a different language through their printed floors and ethnic furniture, still tie together in almost a conversational way! The Theatre room that spills over into a giant balcony area with a bar is the favourite hot spot of the house where you can enjoy a view of lush greenery on one side and the atrium of the home overlooking a concrete jingle on the other.

The curtains were carefully curated by the client herself as she is also an entrepreneur in the handloom space!

The indoor landscape by Kiasma Studio softens out the home even more and never gives you the feel of apartment living.