The Bridge House by Wallmakers, led by architect Vinu Daniel, is a 100-foot suspension home in Karjat, Maharashtra. Built using local materials like wild grass, reclaimed wood, and mud-thatch, it blends seamlessly with nature. Designed to be sustainable and self-sufficient, it minimizes ecological impact while maximizing harmony with its surroundings.
Conceptualised by Wallmakers and spearheaded by lead architect Vinu Daniel in the hills of Karjat, Maharashtra, the Bridge House is a 100 ft suspension bridge over a creek bed, made of four hyperbolic parabolas —arches designed to provide tensile strength — topped with a thatch-and-mud covering. The architecture blends seamlessly into the foliage, becoming one with nature.
The project faced several constraints: the team wanted to build using local materials, but the only resource available in the area was wild grass; they aimed to create a habitable bridge while ensuring enough space for a JCB to clean the streams; and although the land masses needed to be connected, the structure could not extend within the 100 ft width of the spillway.
Despite these challenges, the Bridge House emerged as a farmstead with four bedrooms and an open-air courtyard, offering views of unpolluted, starry skies visible only in remote countryside. Every room is designed in tandem to the nature around it. By using reclaimed wood from ship decks as flooring and jute screens the space is meant to be a part of the environment it inhabits.
Suspended over a 7 m gorge, the bridge is designed to be self-sufficient. Its thatch layer, inspired by the scales of a pangolin, provides both thermal insulation and cooling, maintaining an optimal indoor temperature. As the structure does not have a vertical suspension pillar, the mud thatch stabilises it while also preventing any animals from dwelling in the roof.
One of the main intentions behind the project was to minimise encroachment on the natural landscape. Resting solely on its four parabolic arches, the Bridge House is not just another farm house but a space that at the same time is mindful but also functional in the environment it is built in.
Beyond its striking design, the Bridge House demonstrates how sustainable architecture can thrive even within limitations. Using only what the land offered, the project transforms scarcity into innovation. By building lightly, breathing with the earth, and blending into the landscape, it restores a rare equilibrium — one where architecture becomes a form of quiet environmental conservation.
If you enjoyed reading this here's more from Homegrown:
How Folk Architecture Can Sustainably Preserve Local Identity & Cultural Heritage
One Brick At A Time: Total Environment Wants To Change The Way We Live in Cities
Raving Dots Studio’s Wayanad Homestay Fuses Parametric Design & Vernacular Architecture