Jaali Gable House

The house sits on a hilltop at Senapathy in Idukki, with the valley falling away on two sides. On the entrance side it is a familiar Kerala house: two storeys of white render under steep, dark-tiled gables lined with timber soffits, with a colonnaded verandah along the front. Towards the valley the ground drops, and the house stands on slender dark columns above curved, stone-walled grass terraces that step down the hill like rings.

The jaali gives the house its name. Terracotta jaali fills the gable over the verandah. It sits at the top of the living room, which rises the full two storeys, and brings filtered light and air into it; a second, smaller jaali panel fronts a narrow court beside the stair. The first sketches set the plan by the sun, with the verandah to the south to shade the front rooms and the main windows facing north, and the massing was tested in a sun-hours study of the hilltop.

Terracotta jaali fills the gable, bringing filtered light and air into the room behind it.

The plan is compact. From the verandah the main door opens into the double-height living room, and the dining room beyond it opens through a wide glazed door onto a balcony at the back. Next to the kitchen is a work kitchen with its own chimney. Two bedrooms and two toilets run along one side of the ground floor. Upstairs, a small common area leads to two more bedrooms, one opening through a sliding door onto a glass-railed balcony over the front.

The outer walls are laterite, rendered white, and the roofs are ceramic tiles on a steel frame, with terracotta tile linings between the rafters inside. Natural stone clads a panel beside the verandah, and on the valley front tall slot windows sit in a stone-clad centre panel between two white wings. At night uplights wash the render, and lights set into the terrace walls trace each ring of the garden. The permit was granted in June 2026, and construction is under way.