The Act of Quad designs Mumbai apartment with its own temple

The Act of Quad designs multi-generational Mumbai apartment with its own temple

Two flats in a Mumbai high-rise were combined to create a "minimal but playful" home for three generations, which local studio The Act of Quad has decorated with multiple spherical and rounded shapes.

Located in the city's Ghatkopar suburb, the four-bedroom, 325-square metre apartment is dotted with orbs and circles. Some serve a purpose as mirrors or lights, while others are simply decorative wooden sculptures placed on the floor.

Sofas around a round coffee table with a curved bench and a winding column in Mumbai apartment — The apartment's neutral palette (above) is punctuated by pops of orange and yellow (top image)

"We tried to soften the severity of the minimalist architecture with smooth outlines and rounded shapes," said Priyanka Itadkar, who co-founded The Act of Quad together with Falguni Bhatia.

"The objective of staging the spheres around the apartment was to generate a storyline from the sphere's perspective as if the orb was tumbling and travelling around the home, discovering every corner and object."

Mustard yellow cupboard with sphere cutout in interior by The Act of Quad — Spherical shapes are integrated into furniture or placed on the floor as sculptures

Geometric, custom-made furniture decorates the open floor plan, punctuating the creamy, neutral interior with bursts of warm orange and yellow.

This game of opposites was designed to consolidate the family's various different tastes into one cohesive whole.

Entrance hall with brown painted walls and wooden console with white sphere in Mumbai apartment — A black orb is mounted to the wall in the foyer

"The grandfather, being a cartoonist, really wanted a playful environment in contrast to the minimal taste of his engineer son," Bhatia told Dezeen.

"The family desired a minimal but playful design, which was the opposite of their current old fashioned and ornamented home, made in the late 1940s."

Dining room with wooden table, black chairs and wavy partition wall in yellow by The Act of Quad — The wooden dining table sits on a hemispherical base

In the entrance hall, a decorative wooden sphere clings to a corner next to the door while underneath, a console table with a contrasting white orb balanced on top wraps itself around the same wall.

The foyer opens up into a large open-plan living and dining room, as well as a kitchen that can be hidden behind sliding partition walls.

Dining table setup next to white gypsum artwork and black sphere on the floor in Mumbai apartment — Two gypsum artworks by Vijay Itadkar hang in the dining area

Characterised by its symmetrical set-up, the main room features a round dining table with a hemispherical base on one side and a circular coffee table surrounded by curved benches on the other.

The two areas are divided by a wavy screen in gradient colours that evoke a sunrise.

This same undulating silhouette is picked up in a handmade column, which winds and twists its way from floor to ceiling next to the TV.

From the central communal area, the apartment unfurls in two opposite directions. One wing houses the parents and grandparents, as well as a temple and family room, while the daughter's room occupies the other wing alongside a guest bedroom and study.

White couch with wooden coffee table and curved bench by The Act of Quad — A bench encircles the round coffee table in front of the sofa

After itemising all of the family's household items, the studio incorporated plenty of storage into the plan to ensure that everything could be stowed away in its designated place.

The Act of Quad designed and fabricated most of the furniture and artworks in situ, in order to integrate them seamlessly into the architecture.

"We have derived the art from the space to make it feel like it's a part of the space," Bhatia explained.

Curved walls and mosaic floors leading to temple in Mumbai apartment — The entrance to the temple is tiled in a colourful mosaic

In addition, a number of intricate woodwork pieces were brought over from the family's old home and refurbished to create a sense of continuity.

Among them is a chair with turned legs and spindles that is housed in the apartment's own temple, known as a mandir.

Residential temple interior by The Act of Quad with white marble and stone floors and arched ceiling — Intersecting white arches help to create a feeling of grandeur in the mandir

Here, a small antechamber leads to the inner shrine, which is crisscrossed by intersecting white arches and houses a statue of Hindu deity Krishna.

Other Indian architects who have brought places for worship into the home include Saket Sethi, who has created a home with an egg-shaped garden temple on the outskirts of Mumbai.

Photography is by Ishita Sitwala.