Fingerpost House Ooty
2018
The British bungalow, the Fingerpost house, was created to make the best of both worlds- India and Britain. The objective was to conserve the building with minimal intervention to safeguard its architectural character. The team partnered with an interior designer and a landscape architect from England for the building restoration, with a shared motive to understand the design and preserve it accordingly. All the old panelling, architraves, and ceiling in the house were preserved to their original state. The majority of the original wood and old doors have been restored to their former glory.
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While most of the existing windows are retained, some have been replaced by new ones. The boxed up columns in the porch were opened up to reveal their true forms, and the eaves boards were modified in accordance with the original architecture. Many of the old furniture was also reclaimed. New wooden rafters were added alternatively to the old ones to give the ceiling a richer look. The thrust of the building restoration was to revive the craftsmanship. The house restoration, therefore, called for the revival of many traditional crafts, building techniques, materials and expertise. Its success is a testament to the traditional construction techniques in India, which, while significantly degraded, are nonetheless alive and well in the twenty-first century.