These projects were designed and delivered by other practices and institutions. Our founders contributed as members of those design teams, before studio in•elements existed. We include them because they shaped how we work, not to claim them as our own.
why we share this
Clients often ask whether a young studio has worked at scale, outside the city or with unusual materials. Before founding in•elements, Anushri Shetty and Maitri Uka worked on design teams for large residences, a school in a harsh climate and an experimental timber cabin. The experience is real, and so is the credit to the practices that led the work.
the labyrinth, alibaug
Associated as part of the design team at Architecture BRIO.
A 24,000 sq. ft. single-storey holiday home on a 4.5-acre plot in Alibaug. The design takes a conventional planning grid and selectively subdivides it to create spaces of different scales. A simple, intuitive layout opens into moments of surprise and discovery. Arched openings along the primary and secondary axes frame views of the landscape and connect indoors and outdoors. Everything, down to the lights and door handles, was custom-designed to fit the house’s language, with many rounds of samples.
What it taught us: how to plan a large second home so it still feels personal, and how much the details matter when every element is custom. We now bring that thinking to holiday homes near Mumbai.
house of galleries, kutch
Associated as part of the design team at Architecture BRIO.
A 10,000 sq. ft. multigenerational family home that is also an art gallery, in Kutch, Gujarat. The narrative grew from a short film shown to the client. It drew on Iranian cinema, Piet Oudolf’s Hummelo garden, and artists including Wolfgang Laib and Zarina Hashmi. The form was made by carving spherical arcs out of a solid mass. You enter through a narrow labyrinth that opens into a double-height space leading to the living room. The house is outward-looking like a museum and locally rooted like a home.
What it taught us: how a story can organise a building, and how to design for a place as specific as Kutch. That experience feeds directly into The Seed and into how we approach projects in Gujarat.
JDES school, yavatmal
Associated as part of the design team at SE-ARCH.
The first phase of a larger school and hostel campus in Yavatmal, Maharashtra, where summer temperatures reach 45°C. A weather wall acts as a passive design strategy, cutting heat gain and improving comfort without relying on machines. The building is made of exposed concrete and earth blocks made from the site’s own soil, so it’s durable, climate-responsive and at home in its arid landscape.
What it taught us: passive cooling and site-sourced materials work, and they work at an institutional scale. It’s the foundation of our sustainable design practice.
the voxel, barcelona
A project of the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IAAC) at Valldaura, Barcelona. Maitri contributed to it during her Master’s at IAAC.
A self-sufficient cabin conceived during the Covid-19 pandemic as a safe place to isolate without depending on outside systems. The Voxel is built in cross-laminated timber (CLT) made of Aleppo pine that was milled, dried, processed and pressed on site. All of it was harvested within less than a kilometre of the cabin. Every piece of wood is traced back to the exact tree it came from. The outer skin was charred using a technique inspired by Japanese yakisugi.
What it taught us: material traceability, building with what grows nearby, and designing for self-sufficiency. These ideas shape how we specify materials on every project, at any scale.
what carries into our own work
- Planning around people and stories, not styles.
- Local, honest materials that suit the climate and age well.
- Passive design first, with machines second.
- Custom detailing where it makes a difference.
See how these ideas show up in our own projects in the case studies, or read about our founders.