Cielo Apartment | Sanjay Puri Architects

Cielo Apartment is a compact residential building in Nagpur city, Maharashtra, India. On a relatively small site of 900 sqm, a total buildable area of 3600 sqm is built based on the prevalent rules & client requirements.

The mandatory open spaces on all sides generate a buildable area of only 270 sqm. on each floor. A single 4-bedroom apartment is planned on each floor in this 12 storeyed building. 3 of the bedrooms are located on 3 corners, with the kitchen forming the 4th corner to facilitate cross-ventilation in each room. The living spaces are centrally located to form the focal social interaction space. Nagpur forms the geographical center of India, with extensive summers and temperatures in excess of 40°C for 8 months annually.

Taking cognizance of this climate, each of the main rooms opens into 2 balcony spaces, one open and one screened. This helps to reduce heat gain substantially, simultaneously providing sheltered open spaces to each room.

The screened bays are designed as sectional curves, forming a screen at the lower level and curving outwards to form a balcony at the upper level. These sectionally curved screens alternate horizontally and vertically across the building, providing protection from heat, forming green open spaces for each room, and lending a sculptural quality to the building. These screens allude to the architectural heritage of the region, where screens have existed since the 17th century.

Cielo is designed to create naturally cross-ventilated spaces that are sheathed in response to the climate. The lifecycle carbon footprint is reduced substantially by the design that includes an entire solar panel roof, water harvesting, recycling, in addition to the screened envelope to mitigate heat gain and reduce air-conditioning cost.

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