Gemini

Gemini is a two-storey family house at Maneed, in Ernakulam, on a plot of five cents. Its name comes from its face to the street: two gables, one taller than the other, like a pair that is not quite identical. Under each, the eaves are lined with timber battens that catch the light and give the roof warmth from below. The front is just over nine metres wide, and the two gables fill it.

Each gable crowns a crisp white box, and each box frames its windows in deep surrounds of grey concrete, most of them filled with exposed brick around the timber frames. Between the two, the entrance is set back under a planted, steel-railed balcony, with a wall of brick behind the balcony and a striped screen of brick and plaster beside the door. The images are the studio’s design renders, showing the house as it was drawn.

Two gables, one taller than the other, like a pair that is not quite identical.

The plan is compact and works hard. A small sit-out leads to a foyer, and the living and dining area runs back from the front along one side, with a bay window at the dining table and the kitchen beyond it. Beside the stair, a small courtyard with a built-in seat is open to the floor above, at the middle of the house. A bedroom with its own bay window takes the front corner of the ground floor; upstairs, two more bedrooms open off the landing, with the balcony along the front. The images show the design as drawn.