This modern big house with wall of light in Surat, Gujarat, India. The house designed by Matharoo Associates. The house spaces including spaces for business dealings, guest rooms for long-term visits by relatives, social and entertainment spaces and core family activity spaces together with the dilemma of housing the family in the busy urban setting of a city, creates a house within a larger house.
The two separate entrance hallways allow the smaller home and the larger house to coexist; one opening into the family spaces and the other leading directly into the formal drawing and dining space and veranda outside. The high formal living space in concrete can also be distinguished by the skewed box, representing the industry. The rough diamonds are represented by the concrete walls poured in stone casts and the polished ones are represented by the light emanating onyx wall. One is opaque, the other transparent. One envelops the house and the other ties the house together. One absorbs, the other radiates, one is neutral, the other colourful, one is rough and the other is smooth, diametrical opposites in the same house. The core family and private areas are placed in a “black box” characterized by the use of kadapa stone representing carbon, another avatar of the diamond. The base flooring in economical and common but robust kota stone as if representing continuity, and all this is set against the chic neutrality of travertine representing contemporary living. The industry dwells in between the incoming rough and the outgoing polished stone in all its entirety; static, dark and unyielding spaces placed amidst sunlit areas- dynamic, light and agile.
The three identical staircases are aligned to the three site angles converging near the entrance; one is placed on the floor, second on the wall and the third on the ceiling; signifying the illusionary world of diamonds. Project by Matharoo Associates.
