Experimenting with new design for house at Cherthala

Like any designer with creative nature, I too prefer to create always a new design for each house I take up for construction. For those houses for which I do only initial drawings like Plan and elevation, I do not get opportunity to try out new design and new features

New design has to be worked from start to finish of construction of a building. Also for this I really need a client who does not know much about house construction and hence will not start putting up his own ideas and mostly foolish suggestions thinking that he knows a lot about house design and construction. After designing many houses and directly building more than 200 houses, I am still studying a lot on house design and construction. Each new house I build and design are definitely better than the earlier ones as I keep on improving my design and building techniques based on my previous experiences

When I built Edappally house at Cochin I got enough freedom to slowly work out on improving appearance and utility of the spaces in the building mainly because my Marine Engineer client even though senior to me by experience left the scene for six months leaving me freedom to work out. His wife rarely visited the site. By the time he returned from his work in sea, I have made the structure with an impressive appearance much better than he could hope for

When I was working on the compound wall for that house which was again different with a new design he was present. As expected he was very much against my ideas. I have to threaten to leave the work at that stage to make him relent. Finally when it was finished he and all others praised me for the impressive compound wall design. Another client wanted me to simply copy that compound wall for him. Basically my clients do not have the vision to imagine the outcome of the work being planned by me step by step. Unfortunately I cannot teach them to visualize as I can. This Edappally house design was repeated again at Kalady and Nilambur though I hate repetitions. House design used for our office was repeated seven times in Cochin itself as it is an excellent design for three cents and less than four cents plot with four bed rooms attached along with all usual rooms and facilities

Now I am again working on a new design at Cherthala which when completed will have these specialties

1. . 1.Living room remaining central to the house in the front with no room above and no access from any other room other than common spaces connecting dining, stair and lounge or home theatre.(a lot of people used to tell me that family members should be able to move freely inside house without people sitting in living room noticing them. This facility is provided in this design)
2. Two car porch with access for cars from two sides
3. Poomukham and Charupady
4. Chuttu verandah
5. Side entry to house from Car porch to Poomukham other than front entry
6. Nadumuttom if required
7. Family living area at first floor with Home theatre facilities
8. Common toilet in common area
9. First floor rear space for party3. 10. Kitchen with utility space close by instead of old work area

11. 10. Kitchen with utility space close by instead of old work area
11. Four bed rooms attached-two in each floor
12. Appearance for four level roofs in two storey building

All All these surprisingly with a plinth area less than 3000sft!

At Irinjalakuda I could do a real good work with 4000 sft plinth area with lot of totally new concepts mainly because owner of the house did not know much on house design or construction and hence left me free to experiment

So it is not without any reason that Architects usually tell half jokingly that the house is done well in spite of the owner

Design and Construction of house in Kerala

I keep getting mails from Keralites living in different parts of world saying that he/she intend to construct house in Kerala. Most of them simply ask me how much it will cost to construct a house without even bothering to tell even the place for construction. Most of them simply think that construction of a house is as simple as going and buying something from the market. It is definitely not that simple
1. Prepare a list of what you need in the house
Starting point for construction of a house is preparing a list of what all rooms, facilities you need in the house. Try to make this list after detailed discussions and obtaining inputs from all members of the family. Of course later while discussing with an Architect he may suggest changes and improvements on this wish list based on his knowledge and experience in designing and building houses for many
2. Site visit by Architect
Site visit by an Architect is essential for him to properly visualize your dream home. An experienced Architect can see in his mind how the house should look when completed. If the Architect is well versed in Vasthu, he can also decide on appropriate positions for each room as per Vasthu requirements. A well designed plan is the most important aspect of construction of a house. Even if you pay more for a good design by obtaining a better qualified and experienced Architect, you will save lakhs of rupees and can avoid inconveniences and wastage of space that can occur due to improper design
3. Finalising the Plan
Based on initial requirement details given by you, Architect will prepare a plan showing positions and dimensions of rooms, doors and windows. From the plan drawing you may not be able to understand properly features of the Plan. Hence it is better to get a detailed briefing from the Architect on features of the plan, advantages and disadvantages of the Plan. It will also be better if you obtain a second opinion on the plan from an equally qualified and experienced Architect and try to discuss points raised by second consultant with the first consultant so that you can be sure that the plan prepared is the best considering your site conditions, requirements and financial arrangements
4. Engineering Estimate
Before finalising on the plan try to get an Engineering estimate giving item wise costing at least for the structural part of the building as interior and finishing works can be estimated after completion of structural part of the building depending upon your financial condition at that stage. On the finishing work to be done you will get a clearer picture after the structural work as you can visualize better works required at that stage. If structural costing is not within your reach you can revise the plan at that drawing stage itself rather than waiting for changes after commencement of work
5. Selecting a contractor for the work
While a selecting someone to carry out the work you should try to get someone associated with a professional Architect who will follow procedures of work strictly as per quality standards of an Architect/Engineer with proper structural design for each steel and concrete parts of the building. You should not simply go for the lowest quotation as it can be costly for proper construction of your building in the long run
Like above points there are several matters to be carefully implemented during design and construction of house. You can mail me for free consultation on any stage of construction of your building by writing to
vhthomas@viruvelil.com
You will get a prompt reply from me

Nalukettu type houses-Do we really need it?

In the last week, I visited Cheruthuruthy near Shornur, Anchal near Punalur and Thalayolaparambu on the way to Kottayam from Cochin for site visit before design and construction of houses.
Cheruthuruthy person is an NRI working in Dubai.Anchal person is settled and working in Delhi. Entire family of Thalayolaparambu chap is settled in Bangalore
One common feature for all three guys is that they want house with Nadumuttom or Nalukettu house in the traditional Kerala Architecture style.
For those of you who are not familiar with this Nadumuttom and Nalukettu I will give some basic information. Nadumuttom is an open space in the middle of normally single storied house. In the earlier days roof with wooden rafters and large tiles over it used to be the normally used roof in Kerala. Anyone who climbs up the roof can easily remove one or two tiles and if the wooden rafters are not closely laid, he can easily enter inside the house from top. Probably in the earlier days of Kerala there were no such robberies
Portions with slope roofs on all four sides will have sloping down roof portions merging in the open space called Nadumuttom which is exposed to sky. So any one who climbs up the roof of the house can easily reach the open court yard in the centre of the house called Nadumuttom. Probably due to Joint family living system each of these Nalukettu houses were having large number of people staying together and may be due to the presence of large number of people in the house, they were not afraid of any one climbing down to the centre open court yard of the house.
In the present nuclear family set up, most of the houses in Kerala have only one male occupant and hence insecurity among occupants of the house is very high. Again most of these NRI owned large houses in Kerala has got only old parents staying with nobody else with them. Their children reach home only once in a while on vacation from abroad where they work. Houses are built in anticipation for their retirement days when they return to native Kerala after making enough money by working abroad
House with one Nadumuttom is called Nalukettu. House with two Nadumuttom is called Ettu kettu. Similarly there used to be even Pathinaru Kettu with four nadumuttom in a single building. Obviously in a Pathinaru kettu set up, lot of relatives must be staying together as a joint family and due to presence of large number of male members they were not afraid of any robber even though the house is easily accessible from above.
Nalukettu style of construction also requires a wide passage to be kept on all four sides of Nadumuttom for easy access to Nadumuttom. This feature also increases built up area for the house. When you are going for a Nadumuttom type house, you will naturally have to go for Poomukham and Chuttu verandah, again features of old houses of Kerala land lords who never ever worked with their body. They had low class persons working for them in the field, plantations and paddy fields. Their only activities were eating, sleeping, doing sex and for those interested in arts and music to enjoy arts and music
My clients who might have acquired enough wealth working abroad consider having a Nalukettu house simply to satisfy their ego. In reality a Nalukettu type construction does not give any benefit other than increasing cost of construction in the present scenario. You cannot have an open to sky central court yard now with rain pouring inside at the centre of the house due to security reasons. So you will have to close that portion above with steel fabrication.
Apart from these three persons at Cheruthuruthy,Anchal and Thalayolaparambu a lot more are asking me regularly to design and build Nalukettu houses. I have written all these mainly to stress the futility of going for Nadumuttom and Nalukettu type construction in the modern day Kerala
On the way back from Cheruthuruthy I simply dropped in at Trichur Engineering College where I studied. It was vacation time there. Still a few classes were going on. I walked around the campus noticing new blocks and buildings occupying earlier open spaces. Students still looked insecure like in my days of college. Each place of the campus could rekindle memories in me. Apart from few new buildings, everything looked the same. Even the large drawing halls are still having wooden drawing boards refusing to accept the fact that professional engineering world outside do not even use them as show piece in offices. When outside world is fully computerized, Engineering College is still having closed air conditioned computer labs as sort of show pieces. When will the academic training will get tuned to professional world outside so that engineers capable of working in industry will come out of these engineering colleges? Now those who come out of engineering colleges have to be re educated and retrained to suit industry requirements and demands of the profession
I have noticed name of one of my old classmates in a notice in notice board with a tag professor before the name. I could not meet her as it was vacation time
At Thalayolaparambu, they already have more than 100 year old Ettu kettu which is in a dilapidated condition. I suggested demolishing of this building and constructing a two storied modern Nalukettu which can be used as a Home stay for western tourists. With nearly two acre land around and river flowing in one side with lot of greenery, the place is ideal for Home stay for tourists. Bangalore based owners of the land can come and stay in the Home stay during vacation

This story will not be complete if I do not write about my walk through familiar inside campus road by the side of hockey play ground to reach Engineering college post office. That building which had only post office is now expanded to have a Sate Bank of Travancore branch with an ATM counter.
This time I have noticed several huge mahogany trees in the campus. One huge size tree is there just in front of the post office building by the side of main road in front of Ramavaramapuram Church. The old church is no more there. In the same place there is a bigger church building showing the financial strength of Catholic Church.
Very close to post office building facing the main road, there is the old women’s college, Vimala College. The outside painting of the building and general look and appearance of Vimala College is simply marvelous. Probably when I used to walk in front of this building I used to notice only the living colours in and around the building. They are not there may be due to vacation time. I have also noticed the renovated gate and security cabins of Vimala College which is done well with aesthetic sense

Election for Loksabha-Kerala scenario

After five years those twenty persons who were visiting Delhi as representatives of Kerala and enjoying all facilities and privileges as members of parliament from Kerala have come back to Kerala after the five year merry go around. In these five years most of them have simply slept whenever they felt like attending parliament session to be woken up from comfortable slumber when some north Indian MP was shouting probably due to madness
None of them have done something for the development of the state irrespective of party affiliations. They were acting like puppets in the hands of party managers playing without any self control or self respect.
Election came and candidates of most of the political parties for our twenty seats of parliament are again selected not due to their intelligence or capability to talk for Kerala and work for interests of Kerala people. They are simply selected as per the wishes and likes of few individuals. Most of the left candidates have become so because the mighty Pinaray Vijayan liked them due to reasons known only to him as the party CPM has become a congregation of his followers who will say halleluiah to whatever he says and does even if it is corruption or hobnobbing with extremist communal outfits
He has decided on his own to allot one parliament seat to PDP even though PDP is not a constituent of LDF.For achieving this he was willing to show door to poor CPI which as a political party has only leaders and no followers. He refused sitting seat to Janatadal simply to keep his promise to a dear friend, Faris.So Janatadal has only one way to go-out. He did not bother much about exit of Janatadal. Seat rejected by Janatadal was given to CPI and thus CPI could manage to escape a throwing out of LDF.
On the other side so called Italian high command of Congress did not bother much about win ability while deciding on a candidate. You cannot expect an Italian woman who happened to land up in India by marriage to have all the wisdom and vision expected of a leader of 100 crores people.
At Trivandrum she managed to put a locally unknown figure who talks Malayalam in English accent making me feel irritated every time I hear it in TV as if poor Malayalam language is destined to suffer this bad treatment.
At Kollam she simply assumes that a 92 year old Karunakaran has got supporters outside his family. So a seat is given to a simple sinkidy of Karunakaran with no capability other than being a stooge of Karunakaran.
At Ernakulam she could find only a sitting MLA who does not know how to do anything for anybody else other than himself. Probably he will be a good sleeper in Lok sabha like his predecessor. With carefully selected candidates Congress could have won many seats easily. But who is bothered about winning more seats other than making your sinkidies happy?

Travancore Palace restaurant at Cherthala

Though the food is not good at this restaurant in Cherthala, the architecture is quite impressive with features of traditional Kerala architecture
Dining portion of the restaurant has got a fairly good Nadumuttom with round pillars with carvings on the sides. It also has got a portion where traditional wooden storage area of Kerala is recreated. Pictures will speak better