Home About Contact

Vaishnavi Nayel Talawadekar is an internationally published architecture, design and art journalist.

Learn More

Portfolio

Architecture & Interior Tours

Guides

Design Stories

Art Stories

Architect & Designer Profiles

Architecture, Design & Art Insights

Vaishnavi works out of a sunny studio called Mangomonk where she writes for publications big and small.

Work With Vaishnavi

Publications

Click to view

Latest Articles

Vogue •

Rayna Vallandingham looks like the girl of your dreams, but she can also make you scream

‘Vallandingham’ has the same ring as several surnames in southern India, and in the minute or so before Rayna Vallandingham appears on the screen, I make a mental note to ask which region it originates from. “It’s Dutch,” she says, moments after flickering to life, the morning sun in London haloing her heart-shaped face. “But don’t worry, I get that a lot.” The fourth-degree taekwondo black belt, as I will soon learn, is forgiving when it comes to questions about her ethnicity. The daughter of a...
Wallpaper* •

The top 10 architecture stories of the year: who, what, where and why?

For the top 10 architecture stories of 2024, look no further; we researched, reviewed and reflected to present you with some of the most-read news and features that dominated the headlines of the Wallpaper* world in the past year.The old and the new meet in our pick of the year's finest architecture stories. New cultural institutions, rediscovered modernist marvels, world-class transport infrastructure, interviews, and our annual Wallpaper* Architects’ Directory – all form part of the architectu...
Wallpaper* •

STO.M.P on the architecture studio's work, love of craftmanship and 'the cinematic details'

Husband-and-wife architect duo Vignesh Sekar and Shamini Vignesh love to relax with a good movie, but their weekly routine doesn’t always involve a Coke apiece and a giant tub of popcorn. ‘We love to lean into the cinematic details—the camera angles, the quality of light, the artistic sensibility,’ says Vignesh.The founders and principals of STO.M.P (short for Studio for Modernism & Practical Aesthetics), based in the southern Indian city of Madurai, approach a site in much the same way a cinema...
Wallpaper* •

An Indian mud house and more natural architectural wonders from Sketch Design Studio in Rajasthan

If her weekend home is any indication, it’s safe to assume that Rajasthan-based interior designer Shipra Singhania likes to put her money where her mouth is. In 2023, the founder and principal of Sketch Design Studio, a natural building and interior design practice she established in 2014, used kitchen ingredients to build her family’s pied-à-terre on a four-acre permaculture farm in Alwar, Rajasthan.She conjured the structure with nothing more than mud, lime, and edibles such as neem, jaggery,...
Architectural Digest •

Inside an ethereal Kozhikode home designed to delight the senses

Questions about cake aren’t exactly the sort of thing you lead with when attempting to impress a potential client looking to design their Kozhikode home—but anyone who knows architects Priya Rose and Rahul Mathew can confirm that confection and conversation, for better or worse, go hand in hand for the dauntless duo. “‘Do you like cake?’ That’s the first thing they asked us,” laughs their client, one half of a middle-aged Dubai-based couple who enlisted the duo—after being introduced by a mutual...
Vogue •

Radhika Apte: “My pregnancy wasn’t an accident, but it still came as a shock”

I was curious to know whether, like most women—including myself—Apte ever felt fully prepared to welcome children. “I don’t think you ever come to terms with it,” she said, referring to the notion of parenthood—how one cannot truly understand it without experiencing it. “I think it’s easier when people know whether they want a child or not. In our case, neither of us wanted kids, but there was this one per cent curiosity about what it would be like. Then, when this happened, we wondered whether...
Wallpaper* •

North Studio’s Rahul Bhushan: ‘I’m just a simple boy with a big dream – to make the world a better place’

If you dropped North Studio’s Rahul Bhushan in the middle of a forest with no food or water, by the end of the week, he’ll have designed a sustainable treehouse, started a wildlife yoga retreat, and convinced the squirrels to invest in eco-friendly architecture. The architect, hailing from the Indian Himalayan state of Himachal Pradesh, is a master at harmonising with nature, infusing it into his work by reviving ancient mountain-building techniques.Using wood, stone, and mud, Bhushan creates ea...
The Local Project •

FORTH Atlanta by Morris Adjmi Architects

Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward holds many distinctions: it is the birthplace of Martin Luther King Jr., a haven of scintillating street art, and now, the site of FORTH Atlanta, a new hotel and social club by Method Co. and New City Properties, designed by Morris Adjmi Architects.
Nestled in the green interlude between Historic Fourth Ward Park and Ponce City Market, this innovative hospitality concept exemplifies wellness, design and culture. FORTH Atlanta is where mid-century design meets 1970s pana...
Architectural Digest •

This serene and semi-open farmhouse in Hyderabad is a love letter to Bali

When it came to seeking direction, Kumar listened to his client’s instincts and his own, yes, but he also listened—and looked—to the past. “The design process kicked off by drawing inspiration from the existing structures on-site, with the goal of blending the new building seamlessly into its surroundings,” he says. The brief specified six bedrooms, each with its own semi-open space and connectivity to a common open area. What it didn’t specify was a layout—so Kumar devised his own. He modelled...
Architectural Digest •

Inside a 10,000-square foot Chennai bungalow inspired by a magical childhood home

It’s fascinating how certain childhood memories leave their imprint on adult life: the heady fragrance of frangipanis conjuring your grandmother’s garden; a chequered floor bringing to life the frenzy of hopscotch games; and long, sweeping balconies summoning winds just before a roaring rainstorm. Architect Varsha Menon has her own version of these memories—except in hers, the garden, floor, and balconies were all her own. “The house I grew up in, the one my grandfather built, meant so much to m...
The Local Project •

Deloitte Sydney by Hassell - Issue 16 Feature

For employers and employees alike, the silver lining of the pandemic was the opportunity to establish work ecosystems that allow team members to log in from anywhere. Enter Deloitte’s new Sydney office: situated inside Quay Quarter Tower, a sustainably built high-rise grazing the Sydney skyline, the company’s new workspace – designed by international design studio Hassell – echoes the reverberations of the lockdown, rewriting the rulebook for large, traditional workspaces.
Gone are the days of t...
Architectural Digest •

This apartment in Vijayawada is shaped by artists across India

Entering one’s golden years can bring a lot of joy—cherished time with grandkids, travels to bucket-list destinations, hobbies once put on hold—but for Nagasundararao and his wife, Padmaja, it also brought a lot of questions. “Mainly, where do we live next?” says Nagasundararao, a retired entrepreneur. The Vijayawada-based couple, parents to a daughter and son who had long flown the nest, knew they needed someplace smaller, quieter, and senior-friendly, a home that would comfortably meet their n...
Architectural Digest •

This farmhouse in Karnataka's Tulasigeri is a lesson in simple living

Most weekend mornings, when they’re not busy treating patients at their dispensary in Bagalkot, Karnataka, this doctor couple likes to disappear into the forest at their farmhouse in Karnataka's Tulasigeri. “If not physically, at least visually,” clarifies architect Shreyas Patil, who coolly takes credit for their weekly disappearing act. When Patil designed the farmhouse, about fifteen kilometres away from the couple’s primary residence in Bagalkot, he envisioned a viewing gallery on the side f...
Architectural Digest •

This luminous home in Kottayam, Kerala cleverly deceives the sun

Nobody really remembers their college classes, but few forget the moments in between—the attendance logged ‘by proxy’, the frantic cramming before exams, and the friendships forged at 2 a.m. over a shared serving of kettle-made Maggi. Architect Thomas Parambil, founder and principal of his eponymous Bengaluru-based architecture practice, has lived through each of these, but it’s the friendships that endured long after the exams ended and the noodles were finished that truly shaped his journey—or...
Architectural Digest •

This 1,200-square-foot Mumbai home was designed within a seven-day timeline

As entrepreneurs, Priyanka and Vishal Shah thrive on life in the fast lane—so much so that sometimes, whether they like it or not, the hustle follows them home. Architects Kasturi Wagh and Vineet Hingorani can attest to this. When the Shahs approached the founders and principals of the Mumbai-based design studio kaviar:collaborative to design their new Mumbai home, they came up with a realistic vision but a less-than-realistic timeline. “Seven days,” says Wagh, to whom the couple was introduced...
Architectural Digest •

This 50-year-old bungalow in Vadodara is reborn as a tribute to its owners' worldly adventures

There’s something special about travelling the world, but there’s something even more special about returning home. Just ask Abhit and Shilpi Banerjee. After fifteen years in Singapore, another three in Bangkok, and exploring over 25 countries, returning to India felt like a different kind of homecoming for the couple, now in their sixties. As Abhit explains, however, they had already moved mentally long before. “Six years prior, to be precise,” he says, referring to the moment they found their...
Architectural Digest •

Inside a calming Thrissur home where the outdoors inspire the indoors

Bringing the colours and textures of nature indoors was one thing, but introducing its sounds was quite another. Imagine the gushing of waterfalls, the chirping of birds, or the gentle pitter-patter of water mimicking distant rain. Muaz conjured all of this—and more—inside the home, merging (or demerging, depending on how you see it) the interior with the natural environment. Muaz emphasised playfulness, yes, but he also focused on practicality. He shaped the home into an "H," incorporating vert...
Elle Decor •

[Print/Cover Story] Drawing the Line(s): A Kolkata Home by Abin Chaudhuri

The thing about designing a house that lets the elements in and everything else out is knowing where to draw the line. Ace architect Abin Chaudhuri of Kolkata-based Abin Design Studio is no stranger to such predicaments, having made a career out of drawing lines — literally and figuratively. In 2022, when he took up the reins for a 20,500-square-foot home for a family of five in Kolkata’s plush New Alipur, the first thing he did was draw a line to distinguish indoors from outdoors. Or, as he puts a finer point on the subject, “Find a way to ensure ample natural light and ventilation, while ensuring privacy from prying eyes.” The solution, it seemed, was simple: if he couldn’t take the indoors out, at least he could bring the outdoors in. By keeping the home at one with the landscape, maybe he could camouflage the interior to make it seem invisible from the outside.
Elle Decor •

[Print] Grown from the Earth: A Home in Vadodara by LABwerk

Architect and interior designer Shonan Purie Trehan has a flair for stepping off the beaten path, as much at work as in the wilderness, and sometimes, if the stars align just so, in both together at once. “We first met while training for a fifty kilometre Oxfam walk in the wilderness,” shares the founder and principal of Mumbai-based full-service design practice LABwerk, the we in question being herself and Vadodara-based couple Shalini and Anand Raghavan. “Walking led to talking and we really got to know each other,” adds Shonan. The kinship endured long after the training was over, and yet beyond the course of the next year, so that when it came time for the Raghavans to entrust someone to build a home to their liking in their hometown in Gujarat, the compass pointed towards Shonan.
Elle Decor •

[Print] House of Two Spirals by Abhimanyu Dalal & Project810

One site. Two halves. Three important considerations. That was how Abhimanyu Dalal approached a farmhouse project in New Delhi. “We decided right away to divide the property down the middle to place the house at one end,” says the veteran architect and founder of his eponymous New Delhi-based practice Abhimanyu Dalal Architects. He collaborated with former EDIDA winner Vritima Wadhwa of Project 810 for the interior design of the strikingly contemporary home with its roofs silhouetted against the sky. “We imagined a house on one end and landscape on the other. Nothing in between,” he adds. The composition of the various architectural elements took into account not only the owners’ art collection but more importantly, the light, greenery and the surrounding vistas. Floor-to-ceiling windows, some double height, are a defining feature that extend the architecture outwards. Given that one of the owners, a renowned gallerist, had a penchant for art, and already had an enviable collection, the second consideration was designing a setting that created a dialogue with the spaces. And the third was ensuring that the place felt natural to the family, as if they’d known and loved it all along.
The Wall Street Journal •

Inside a $287,000 Kitchen Where Adults Can be Adults

Most parents with young children would agree that redesigning a home—and then maintaining it—isn’t for the faint of heart. But for one lionhearted Chicago couple, the proud new owners of a home in Southport Corridor, bought for $2.85 million in 2023, the reward seemed to outweigh the risk. “Even though we have two kids under 7, we wanted the house to look cool and feel grown-up,” says the wife, a 45-year-old stay-at-home mom.
Load More

In Print

Click to read

AD Visits

Architectural Digest •

AD Visits: Diipa Büller-Khosla's canal house in Amsterdam is a postcard from 1614

Even from 6,000 kilometres away, Diipa Büller-Khosla’s energy is palpable through the screen. It’s morning where she is, and she and her husband and business partner, Dutch former diplomat, Oleg Büller-Khosla (the couple legally adopted each other's last names when they married in 2018) are perched in the kitchen of their Amsterdam home, in the company of their pet pooches, Kubii and Bimbo.

By their own admission, it’s a scene that just a few years ago, was a figment of their imagination. “We'd
Architectural Digest •

AD Visits: Ishaan Khatter’s Mumbai apartment is a sunset sanctuary

When he isn't busy filming or promoting or air-dashing off to exotic locales, Ishaan Khatter likes to appreciate the little things in life. “On Sunday mornings, when time permits, I slip off for a bike ride. In the evenings, I like to watch the sunset with some music and coffee,” says the actor, who was last seen in supernatural comedy Phone Bhoot, alongside Katrina Kaif and Siddhant Chaturvedi. So when he moved in a three-bedroom apartment along the Bandra sea face, naturally, his first priorit
Architectural Digest •

AD Visits: Actor Aahana Kumra’s Mumbai apartment is a pretty-in-pink princess pad

In a building full of identical brown doors, Aahana Kumra's entrance is the only non-brown curiosity. "I absolutely love pink. It's my all-time favourite colour—that's why it's right at the front," she laughs, holding open the candyfloss-coloured opuscule as she ushers me inside. For Kumra, the home is a manifestation twenty years in the making, and one that nods equally to her Lucknowi roots and her life in Mumbai. "There are whiffs of Kashmir, London and Delhi too. It's a collection of all my
Architectural Digest •

AD Visits: Actor Aparshakti Khurana’s Mumbai home displays drama in the details

Even before they had finalised their house, or decided who would design it, actor Aparshakti Khurana and his wife, events entrepreneur Aakriti Ahuja, had a chandelier picked out and stowed away in storage. "I had spotted it some years ago in Delhi and just knew I had to buy it," laughs Aakriti, and Aparshakti chimes in, "We had no idea what our future house would look like. Nothing was set in stone, except this big, blue bhaisahab." The bhaisahab in question now occupies a corner of their living
Architectural Digest •

AD Visits: Singer Armaan Malik’s Mumbai home is halfway between London and Los Angeles

At 10 AM on a Sunday, the last thing you'd expect is for Armaan Malik to be crisping the edges of a frittata. And yet, that's exactly the sight that greets me as I step into his kitchen, a California-cool bolthole with a London-esque edge. "I love making breakfast and treating myself to a good spread," he says, drizzling butter on bruschettas. Dressed in a casual button-up and chinos, he looks like a laid-back version of his on-screen alter ego, who, as fans of The Voice (on which Armaan appears
Architectural Digest •

AD Visits: Actors Aditya Seal and Anushka Ranjan’s newlywed nest is a storybook come to life

At the door of actors (and newlyweds) Aditya Seal and Anushka Ranjan Seal's new Mumbai duplex, the nameplate is conspicuous by its absence. What is not is the cheery (LED) baby seal that takes its place, animating the wall and nodding to its namesake owners. “It's fun to watch people guess," says Anushka. "Those who get it, get it. And it makes for a great conversation-starter." But the unlikely sea creature isn’t the only thing setting the entryway apart—because if the peach-toned front door (a