A place that initiates an intense experience in turn making you richer by the time you leave for the city

Architects: Within N Without
Location: Nashik, India
Year: 2016
Area: 1.200 ft²/ 111 m²
Photo courtesy: Vikrant Dashputre
Description:

“As the urban dweller tired from the stresses of everyday life, seeking rejuvenation, turns towards nature, his quest is to seek inner joy, unbound his energies to become one with the forces of nature.

The chaos of city life drives a man to pursue the tranquility and search for the inner peace, which so alludes him in his mundane life. The Charm of city life and the appeal of nature is the chasm a man seeks to bridge and in that keeps searching for a meaningful existence.

It is this search which brings us to gumpha and its environs. Gumpha bridges the chasm between the darkness in the depths of lands and the light which comes calling from the heavens; celebrating the communion of the two. The user is drawn into this play of light and darkness; discovering his part in the drama as he becomes part of the bigger script, making a journey, discovering the meaning of the larger picture, each having his own definition.

But more than all that gumpha is A response… to the adventurous nature of explore. An expression… of the innate nature of land and hills to surprise. A journey… to lose the identity and discover self. A poetry… by the earth itself. A dialogue… between man and nature.

Gumpha is a search of the designer looking for a language to answer nature’s callings. It is a narration of the most organic response of the architect to the immediate environment.

As you move along the path the land opens up to you, taking you along its winding ways slowly revealing the surrounding, drawing you into an atmosphere. You are introduced to gumpha when you least expect it and it comes to meet you, inviting you to delve into it, seek its spaces, travel its depths. It wants you to discover, to explore, to find something new each time you walk along.

The form it takes is mostly organic, where the earth itself seems to breathe in tandem with light to create what can be called as an almost living and sensuous organism, arousing the curiosity with its silent light and playful inquisitive spaces. It almost humors you by appealing the child in you in playing with itself, making you wonder, drawing you in the insides, taking you along on the roof.

At the same time, it helps you search for your inner self as the deep spaces lit by heavenly light offer you tranquility and peace to meditate. where in the interior are introvert and contemplative, the exteriors offer you vistas of the surroundings, engaging both joyous and peaceful essence of man, initiating an intense experience, in turn making you richer by the time you leave for the city.”