Udaipur is a lake city ringed by the Aravalis, and a room here is really a negotiation with a view. The discipline is knowing when to get out of the way of it.
Work in Udaipur tends toward private homes with a prospect worth framing, haveli conversions where the existing bones are the most valuable thing on site, and boutique hospitality where guests are paying for atmosphere more than square footage.
Marble is close at hand and easy to overuse; we prefer it in restrained inlay and thresholds rather than wall to wall. Lime plaster in the warm mineral tones of the surrounding hills sits better against the landscape than white. Courtyards, jharokhas and deep verandahs are the historic climate strategy here and they still work — they cut the western sun, hold cool air overnight and give a house its rhythm.
Old structures rarely match their drawings, so we survey properly before committing. Where a haveli has existing stonework, carved brackets or old flooring worth keeping, we plan around them rather than through them — the patina is the part you cannot buy.
Drawing and coordination at NYKS is moving onto BIM. The project is modelled in three dimensions and resolved before it is built — joinery against services, structure against finishes — with quantities taken from the model rather than estimated. On a turnkey job in Udaipur that is what keeps the site free of expensive surprises.
NYKS is a turnkey studio: the same people who draw the room are accountable for the room that gets built — design, artisan commissioning, procurement, site execution and handover. We do not take styling-only engagements. More about the studio and how it works is on the about page.
Where a project needs them, we bring in specialists by niche — a landscape designer when the garden is part of the architecture, a lighting designer when the room depends on how it is lit, MEP consultants so services are engineered rather than accommodated, and IT and AV consultants where the space has to be genuinely intelligent. Their work is coordinated in BIM against ours, so everything agrees on the drawing before it has to agree on site.
Yes. The studio models and coordinates a project in three dimensions before it is built, so services, joinery and finishes agree, quantities come off the model, and changes propagate rather than being missed.
Yes. The approach is conservative with the existing fabric: survey first, keep what has aged well, and introduce new work so that it reads as new rather than as imitation.
By deciding early what the view is for. Not every room should chase it. We plan the sequence so the prospect arrives as a moment rather than a constant, and we control glare and heat gain on the west-facing glass.
Udaipur is a straightforward drive from our Jaipur studio, and it is one of the cities we travel to regularly for site work.
Local marble used sparingly, lime plaster in mineral tones drawn from the Aravalis, solid timber, brass and hand-carved stone.