Palmyra House Case Study: Plan, Louvres and Craft (Studio Mumbai)

Palmyra House is a weekend house by Studio Mumbai, led by Bijoy Jain, at Nandgaon near Alibag on the Maharashtra coast, completed in 2007. It is two long timber volumes set in a working coconut plantation, wrapped in louvres made from the trunks of the palmyra palm and built by hand by the studio's own carpenters. This case study covers the brief, site, plan, section, materials, climate, reception and what designers in India can learn from it, with MOA's own diagrams.

The brief and the client

The brief was a retreat from the city. The architect's description, as published by designboom in September 2008, calls the house a refuge from the bustle of Mumbai. Architectural Record's Record Houses 2008 feature, by Prathima Manohar, says the family uses it as a vacation home and that Mumbai is "just an hour across nearby Mandwa Bay". The Aga Khan Award project page calls it a weekend retreat on coastal agricultural land facing the sea.

Two conditions came with the land. The coconut plantation was still working, so the trees were to stay. And it was laced with an old water system: Architectural Record describes the plantation's 80-year-old stone aqueducts, and the architect's text says the buildings overlook a network of wells and aqueducts that connect the site. Both shaped the plan.

Who designed Palmyra House

Bijoy Jain was born in Mumbai in 1965, took his M.Arch at Washington University in St Louis in 1990, worked in Los Angeles and London from 1989 to 1995, and returned to India in 1995 to set up his practice, according to the Swiss Architectural Award's 2011 to 2012 winner page. The same page describes Studio Mumbai as "a human infrastructure of skilled craftsmen and architects who design and build the work directly".

The credit list matters. Architectural Record names an eight-person project team, from Jeevaram Suthar and Punaram Suthar to Samuel Barclay and Roy Katz. When you cite the house in a thesis or studio report, credit Studio Mumbai and Bijoy Jain, and name the team from that list rather than Jain alone.

Palmyra House location: site and context

The site is a coconut grove on the coast near Nandgaon. Architectural Record gives it as a 1-acre site in a working plantation, reached on foot about 165 ft (about 50 m) from the road. The Aga Khan Award page says the house lies "in the shade of an extensive coconut grove" and faces the sea. The architect's text puts the sea to the west and dense palm foliage to the east.

This is the Konkan coast, where the design has to cope with sea air and the monsoon as well as heat. Architectural Record notes that the grey-green floor was chosen to echo the colour of coconut bark during the monsoon, which tells you the house was designed with the wet season in mind and not only the dry one. For the wider picture of materials on this coast, see our guide to building materials for Goa, Konkan and Mangaluru.

Concept and design ideas

Jain told Architectural Record that "in this case, it was about a light, air-filled volume". Open magazine's 2019 profile of Jain, by Lhendup G Bhutia, quotes him calling the house "just two wooden boxes". Read together with the published descriptions, three ideas carry the scheme:

• Split the house in two. The rooms are placed in two oblong volumes, "slightly offset from each other" (Aga Khan Award), with an open court between them.
• Make the walls a screen, not a barrier. The facades are mostly louvres of palmyra palm, which Architectural Record says admit air and light.
• Keep the plantation working around the house. The trees stay, the old wells and channels stay, and the pool in the court refers to the aqueducts. Much of the house was built by hand so as not to disturb the land, Architectural Record reports.

Palmyra House plan and zoning

The architect's text published by designboom and by Jidipi sets out the zoning. The north volume holds the living room, study and master bedroom. The south volume holds the kitchen, dining area and guest bedrooms. Between them is a plaza of black basalt with a pool that works as a swimming channel, with views of the sea to the west and palms to the east.

Architectural Record adds detail on the north volume: the master bedroom sits above and overlooks the living area, and has an open-to-sky copper shower enclosure and a small window towards the ocean. The Aga Khan Award's photo captions call it a mezzanine master bedroom. The same article says the court between the two volumes is 25 ft (about 7.6 m) wide, that the dining area faces the pool, and that the study, like many spaces in the house, opens fully to the outdoors.

For the real drawings, ArchDaily's 2010 project page carries Studio Mumbai's site plan, ground and first floor plans, section, site section, an exploded axonometric and two sketches. The Aga Khan Award page shows a site plan credited to Studio Mumbai.

What the zoning does is simple and worth noticing. Each volume is long and narrow, so air can cross it through the louvres on both long sides. Public rooms (living, dining) face each other across the water, so the court becomes the real living room of a weekend house. Private rooms sit at the ends and on the upper level.

Palmyra House section and structure

Both volumes sit on stone plinths. The architect's text says the structural framing is ain, a local hardwood, joined with traditional interlocking joinery, and that the stone for the plinths, aqueduct walls and pool plaza is locally quarried black basalt. The Swiss Architectural Award page adds that the framing was prepared in the studio's workshop and assembled on site.

The roofs are standing-seam aluminium with hand-worked copper flashing (architect's text). The published descriptions do not give heights, spans, member sizes or roof pitches, so our section shows the principle only: a raised timber frame, louvre walls on both faces, a double-height living room under the mezzanine bedroom in the north volume, and the coconut canopy over everything.

For students searching "palmyra house section": the useful thing to draw is the layering from outside in. Palm canopy, then a louvre screen, then a timber frame, then an open interior, all lifted on a stone base. That sequence, not any single dimension, is what makes the house work.

Materials and construction: palmyra louvres and craft

The house is named after its louvres. The architect's text says they were hand-crafted from the outer part of the trunk of the palmyra, a local palm. Architectural Record says the palm was locally harvested, dried and cut. The sources we read do not give the number of louvres, their section, their spacing or whether any of them open, so we do not either.

The rest of the palette is short and local:

• Ain wood for the structural frame (architect's text), and for the stairs and much of the interior (Architectural Record).
• Teak for interior finishes (architect's text).
• India patent stone, a hand-finished, pigmented cement plaster, for the floors (Architectural Record; the architect's text calls it a refined pigmented plaster).
• Plaster pigmented with sand from the site (Aga Khan Award).
• Black basalt, quarried locally, for plinths, aqueduct walls and the pool plaza; the Aga Khan Award page also lists boundary walls and paving.
• Copper for flashing and the open-air shower, and aluminium for the standing-seam roofs.

How Studio Mumbai built it

The construction method is the most cited part of the project. The Swiss Architectural Award page says the plantation was so dense that no heavy equipment could be used, so "all phases of work were executed manually by artisans from the studio". Architectural Record says much of the house was built by hand by Studio Mumbai's longstanding team of carpenters, to avoid disturbing the land. The Aga Khan Award page says the design and detailing came from collaboration between architect and craftsmen, who tested local and foreign techniques and refined them.

The same Swiss Architectural Award page describes the studio's general method: ideas developed through "large-scale mock-ups, models, material studies, sketches and drawings", with design and construction feeding each other. Open magazine reported in 2019 that the studio's workshop in Alibaug, across the road from Jain's home, had around 120 craftsmen, including carpenters, masons, plumbers and electricians. That 2019 figure is not the size of the team that built the house.

Light, climate and services

There is no published account of mechanical cooling at Palmyra House, and no published measurement of temperatures inside it. What the sources describe is passive. The Aga Khan Award page says the louvres on the elevations allow passive cooling, as does the shade of the coconut trees. Architectural Record says the louvres admit air and light. Since many rooms open fully to the outside, the house behaves more like a shaded pavilion than a sealed box.

Water is the one service the sources describe in detail. According to the Aga Khan Award page, water comes from three wells on the site, is filtered, stored at the top of a water tower and fed to the house by gravity. The pool in the court, Architectural Record says, alludes to the plantation's old stone aqueducts.

Reception: awards, critics and what is not documented

The house was published early and widely. Architectural Record included it in Record Houses in April 2008, and designboom ran it in September 2008 with Hélène Binet's photographs. It was shortlisted in the 2008 to 2010 cycle of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, whose page sums it up as "a quietly compelling project that is fully integrated into its landscape".

Studio Mumbai as a whole won the Swiss Architectural Award for 2011 to 2012, and the award page describes Palmyra House among its works. The jury, chaired by Mario Botta, voted unanimously and praised "a return to expert craftsmanship", according to the award's page. The Venice Biennale gave the studio a Special Mention in 2010 for its installation "Work-Place", according to the profile published for its 2012 exhibition at TOTO GALLERY·MA in Tokyo; that award was for the installation, not the house.

What we could not find matters too. We found no published account of leaks, termite damage, repairs, alterations or how the palm louvres have weathered since 2007. Sources also disagree on small points: the Aga Khan Award names Jamshyd Sethna as client while Open magazine names someone else, and Open calls the house a resort while every other source calls it a house or weekend retreat. Where they disagree, we have followed the award record and the architect's own description.

What designers in India can take from it today

These are our reading, not claims from the architect.

1. Let the site set the construction method. A dense grove ruled out heavy machines, so the frame was made in a workshop and joined by hand on site. On a farm plot, hill site or tight urban lot, ask early what can reach the site, and size the parts to suit.
2. Thin volumes and two-sided screens before machines. Two narrow blocks with louvres on both faces, shaded by trees, is a plan any coastal house can borrow. It costs nothing to arrange a plan this way; it costs a lot to air-condition a deep one.
3. Use what the land already has. Palmyra trunks, site sand in the plaster, local basalt, the old wells and aqueducts: each came from the place. Before you specify, list what grows, is quarried or already exists within a short distance.
4. Plan for upkeep on the coast. Timber, palm and copper by the sea need maintenance, and no maintenance record for this house is published. If you build in natural materials near the sea, write the care schedule into the handover. Our guide to building a house near the sea covers salt, damp and fixings.

Documenting a building for studio or thesis? Our field checklist for architecture case studies shows what to record and draw.

Visiting Palmyra House and seeing the drawings

Palmyra House is a private home. It is not open to visitors, and we found no official page offering visits. Please do not enter the plantation without the owners' permission.

To study it, start with the drawings and photographs on ArchDaily (plans, sections, axonometric and Hélène Binet's photographs) and the Aga Khan Award page (photographs by Rajesh Vora and a site plan).

Planning a house on the coast or in a plantation? Find an architect on MOA.

FAQ

Who is the architect of Palmyra House?

Studio Mumbai, led by Bijoy Jain. Architectural Record (2008) lists a project team that includes Jeevaram Suthar, Punaram Suthar, Mangesh Mhatre, Roy Katz and Samuel Barclay.

Where is Palmyra House located?

Near the fishing village of Nandgaon in the Alibag (Alibaug) area of Maharashtra, south of Mumbai, in a coconut plantation facing the sea. Architectural Record says Mumbai is about an hour away across Mandwa Bay.

When was Palmyra House built?

It was designed in 2005 to 2006 and completed in 2007, according to the Aga Khan Award for Architecture.

What are the dimensions of Palmyra House?

The Aga Khan Award gives 277 m², and Architectural Record and the architect's text give about 3,000 sq ft, on a 1-acre site. Architectural Record gives the court between the two volumes as 25 ft wide. No other dimensions are published in the sources we read.

Why is it called Palmyra House?

After its louvres, which were hand-made from the outer part of the trunk of the palmyra palm, a local species, and cover most of the facades.

Sources

• Aga Khan Development Network, Aga Khan Award for Architecture: Palmyra House: client, design and completion years, 277 m², 2008 to 2010 shortlist, two offset volumes, ain wood, palmyra louvres, basalt, site-sand plaster, collaboration with craftsmen, passive cooling, wells, filter, water tower and gravity feed, summary quote, photo credits (accessed 4 Nov 2026)
• Architectural Record, Prathima Manohar: Palmyra House, Record Houses 2008, 1 Apr 2008: team, client description, 1-acre site, 3,000 sq ft, 25 ft court, approach from road, master bedroom and shower, louvres, ain wood, India patent stone, aqueducts, construction by carpenters, Jain's quote, distance from Mumbai (accessed 4 Nov 2026)
• designboom, Ridhika Naidoo: Palmyra House by Studio Mumbai, 5 Sep 2008: the architect's description of zoning, pool, joinery, louvres, roofs, finishes and basalt (accessed 4 Nov 2026)
• Jidipi: Palmyra House, Studio Mumbai: the same architect's description, year and location (accessed 4 Nov 2026)
• ArchDaily: Palmyra House / Studio Mumbai, 31 May 2010: year, location, photographer, list of drawings (accessed 4 Nov 2026)
• Swiss Architectural Award: Third edition 2011 to 2012, winner Studio Mumbai: Bijoy Jain's biography, the jury and Mario Botta's words, the studio's method, Palmyra House's workshop framing and manual construction (accessed 4 Nov 2026)
• Open magazine, Lhendup G Bhutia: Bijoy Jain's Path of Least Resistance, updated 29 Aug 2019: Jain's "two wooden boxes", the Alibaug workshop and its craftsmen; its client name differs from the award record (accessed 4 Nov 2026)
• TOTO GALLERY·MA: Studio Mumbai Praxis, profile, exhibition 12 Jul to 22 Sep 2012: Venice Biennale 2010 Special Mention for "Work-Place" (accessed 4 Nov 2026)