Lounge
Homes should reflect character and intimacy
Summary
The idea of over-designed perfected interiors and outlandishly fanciful architecture, particularly for residences, seems out of touch with the world around it
Have we reached peak design? That thought ran through my mind as I coursed through a new book featuring 20 “iconic" houses in the country, a collection of residences created by some of the leading design studios in India. The projects are relatively new in that they span the past decade or a little more, and therefore haven’t really stood the test of time to be classified as being iconic. I stayed with the book and its information for a while to understand why it left me feeling numb. For one, I almost wished someone would go in and ruffle things up in its pictures. With the exception of a few, most were almost ludicrously vast in scale. Most were also unduly dramatic in form, of course photogenic but without the simple logic demanded of homes.
Perhaps as a combination of the editorial preference to clean out signs of everyday life from pictures and the choice of projects, the book gives the impression that all those factors have an outsize importance over other simpler qualities, particularly, character and intimacy, even though we know that homes are the very places that should be created on a humane scale. No one would disagree that for a home to feel like a shelter, it must be made to incite an emotional response, and not just for pretty photographs. But here we are.
Also read: Turn your office into a homely one
I’ve written about intimacy a lot in my columns because I feel it is an abstract conundrum that is so difficult to tap into, and so difficult to design around. I am reminded of a conversation I had last year with my architect friend, Suchi Reddy. She is the founding principal of Reddymade design studio, based in New York. Over the years she’s been responsible for some marquee design projects and public art works, and the fundamental ethos of her design work is “feeling over form".
Conversations with her have made me more conscious of this abstract, esoteric element related to design, but it’s now become my touchstone. I quote Suchi often in the context of her work in a fledgling area of study called neuroaesthetics. “Your biology responds to your environment constantly and neuroaesthetics is the study of that," she says. “Neuroaesthetics examines how your body and your mind is responding to and being acted upon by your environment. It is a cyclical relationship, we affect our environment and our environment affects us and that’s why it’s so important to take care of both ends, ourselves and our environment. When we do a residential project, I’m thinking about neuroaesthetics. If I’m designing somebody’s office, I’m not just putting a window where I think the light is coming in, the window is going to be where it needs to be in terms of the horizon. Is it going to allow your brain to work in a different way, are you going to feel things differently—those are the kinds of things that affect it."
Suchi says the neuroaesthetic aspect of a project is a synthesis of all the decisions made for it. But importantly, all those decisions are taken with a focus on the well-being of those experiencing a space and factors that will help them flourish.
My beginnings in the design world was as the editor of a design magazine, and I was responsible for setting up many of the systems of styling that I myself have now come to realise have aged badly. But that’s okay; it’s okay to learn and change from our experience, from our understanding of design, appreciation for objects, art, the world around us—all of it. The idea of over-designed perfected interiors and outlandishly fanciful architecture, particularly for residences, seems out of touch with the world around it. If we need to feel more, to present our authentic selves, we need to be less obsessed with our homes presenting themselves like they’re just settings for earning social capital.
Increasingly, I am charmed by spaces that are not so self-conscious and evoke a certain emotional response as happenstance. Where things are put together without artifice, and by chance have achieved a certain personality and offer something refreshing.
In my hunt for places with some emotional recall, my mind often lands up in the most unlikely of places. I live in Bengaluru, and this is a city of nostalgia. You cannot have a conversation with anyone who’s lived here before the pandemic without hearing a lament about various aspects of the city and how it’s changed, particularly the city’s pub scene. I understand what they mean. There are vast numbers of massive multi-storeyed soulless bars, places where the music is so loud you have to talk above it, the food is indecisive and the mood lacklustre. The design of these spaces looks similar, as if they stepped out of the same person’s Pinterest board.
As a counterpoint, there are a few—very few, may I add—smaller establishments, older unpretentious ones. My partner and I often go to Dolphins Bar and Kitchen, established in 1977 with what they call “a homely, Mangalorean touch". A real example of an old neighbourhood bar. It is exceptionally popular, and when I think of why new customers such as ourselves like it as much as its old ones, I think it is because it has retained some undoctored simplicity that doesn’t exist in its fancier peers.
The ground floor of Dolphins is low-lit and moody; the bar sits on one end of the room and looks out at a very simply organised space of tables. It is what I’d call “un-designed", a place where practicality has led space-making choices. The rest of the two floors are open, outfitted with basic tables and benches around the periphery of the floors, while the centre of the rooms has square wooden tables and chairs, the sort you see on Amazon. Its idiosyncrasies lie where it matters, like the music and the “vibe". Much like Indian Coffee House establishments, which are still outstandingly modern and charismatic in a way newer cafes can only hope to be.
Quirks and a bit of character are even more important in homes. The easiest and simplest way to do it is to highlight what is particular to your space, to your way of life. Maybe it’s books, maybe it is a collection of objects, perhaps it’s photography, whatever it is, bring it centre forward and let it establish the identity of your space. Last thing you want, is to have a designed space that looks as picture perfect as a Pinterest board.
Manju Sara Rajan is an editor, arts manager and author who divides her time between Kottayam and Bengaluru.
