Will Contemporary Classic look old-fashioned?

Not if the ornament is left out. Flat panelling, plain profiles, a restrained palette and modern lighting keep it current; the symmetry and the materials give it the permanence a family villa wants.

Does it suit an apartment, or only villas?

It suits any home with generous rooms. In an apartment the panelling, the axis and the tailored furniture do the work without the stair; a 4 BHK with a proper dining room takes it very well.

Which of your projects is in this style?

The Limestone Arch Villa, a five-bedroom home in Yelahanka, shown in the portfolio as a folder of six rooms — stair hall, living, dining, kitchen, pooja room and primary bedroom — with its finishes listed.

Contemporary Classic interior design in Bangalore

The grammar of a classical house — symmetry, panelling, a proper stair hall — built with modern restraint.

Contemporary Classic living room with painted panelling, bookmatched marble and tailored seating, designed by Élara & Co.

The Principles

What makes a room Contemporary Classic

Every generation rebuilds the classical house for its own time. This version takes the proportion and the symmetry — the centred fireplace, the paired lamps, the panelled wall — and removes the ornament, so the rooms are recognisably formal without a single carved swag. It is the language most large Indian villas want and few achieve without tipping into pastiche.

Symmetry and Axis
Rooms organised around a centre — a fireplace, a window, a bed — with pairs either side, and doors aligned so one room looks through to the next.
Panelling Without Ornament
Wall panelling, wainscot and cornice in flat profiles, painted or in timber, giving the walls architecture without decoration.
Marble and Dark Timber
Bookmatched marble in the main rooms, walnut or stained oak in the joinery, brass in the hardware — the classical materials, used plainly.
Tailored Furniture
Sofas and chairs with a made-to-measure quality, upholstered in wool and velvet, in a small number of quiet colours.
A Stair Worth the Hall
In a villa the stair is the one object seen from every floor; here it is stone, timber and metalwork made to measure, in a hall designed to hold it.

All Styles →Browse the Design Boutique →

The Materials

What Contemporary Classic is made of

The palette is the style. Each of these is specified by grade and named in the quote, so what was drawn is what arrives.

Bookmatched marble
Walnut and stained oak
Painted timber panelling
Wool and velvet upholstery
Polished and antique brass
Plaster cornice and mouldings
Silk and wool rugs
Crystal and glass lighting, sparingly

Where It Suits

The rooms and homes it is made for

Large Villas

Five bedrooms, a stair hall, a formal living room and a dining room for twelve want a style with structure, and this one has it.

Multi-Generational Homes

Its formality suits a family with parents and grandparents at the table, and its plan gives every generation a room of its own.

Pooja Rooms and Foyers

Symmetry, marble and brass are the natural language of an arrival and a pooja room; the style does both with dignity.

From the Portfolio

Homes designed in Contemporary Classic

In Design6 rooms

Double-height living room with a limestone arch onto a fumed oak library wall, a ribbed oak ceiling, a brass chandelier, curved ivory bouclé sofas and a bronze sculpture

Dining room with fluted fumed oak panelling, a long limestone table with ivory bouclé chairs, a bronze branch chandelier, a stone console with a sculpture and a large abstract canvas

Primary bedroom with a fumed oak headboard panel, brass reading lights, a slim brass pendant, an ivory bouclé bed with a camel throw and a limestone bench

Kitchen with fumed oak cabinetry, a honed limestone island with waterfall ends, three brass globe pendants, lit brass-framed shelves and a fluted oak breakfast nook

Pooja room with a backlit honey onyx wall, a marble altar with a brass idol and diyas, carved oak jaali doors, a brass pendant and marigold garlands

Stair hall with a cantilevered limestone staircase, a slim brass handrail, a cascading brass and glass pendant, fumed oak panelling and an olive tree

The Limestone Arch Villa

5BHK villa · Yelahanka · Contemporary Classic

Walk through every room, priced₹34.9L – ₹64L*

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In the Design Boutique

Contemporary Classic room concepts, with plans and costs

The Limestone Villa Lounge

Living room

The Brass Veil Pooja Room

Pooja room

The Champagne Dressing Room

Dressing room

Narrow walk-in wardrobe at night: a thirteen-foot run of floor-to-ceiling wardrobes in smoked bronze lacquered glass on slim champagne aluminium frames, a walnut carcass with hanging shirts, folded knits and drawers glowing through them, one door open; shallow walnut shelves on the facing wall lit from the edge, holding handbags, folded linen and shoes on angled shelves; a full-height brass-framed mirror and a brass drum pendant on the end wall, a small ivory bouclé ottoman with a camel knit throw over it in front of the mirror, a cove-lit ceiling and an oatmeal wool runner on a pale stone floor

The Walnut Walk-In

Dressing room

The Whole Boutique →

Considered Questions

Before you begin

Will Contemporary Classic look old-fashioned?: Not if the ornament is left out. Flat panelling, plain profiles, a restrained palette and modern lighting keep it current; the symmetry and the materials give it the permanence a family villa wants.
Does it suit an apartment, or only villas?: It suits any home with generous rooms. In an apartment the panelling, the axis and the tailored furniture do the work without the stair; a 4 BHK with a proper dining room takes it very well.
Which of your projects is in this style?: The Limestone Arch Villa, a five-bedroom home in Yelahanka, shown in the portfolio as a folder of six rooms — stair hall, living, dining, kitchen, pooja room and primary bedroom — with its finishes listed.