Hotel at Bodhgaya
Hospitality Interior Design I Gaya, Bihar
Client Marasa Hospitality Pvt. Ltd.
Area 76,000 Sq.ft
Status Completed 2020
Photographer Niveditaa Gupta
Team Shimul Javeri Kadri, Vaishali Mangalvedhekar, Roshni Kshirsagar, Ipsita Mallick, Aparna Kale
The symbolic qualities of the Buddha are embodied through gestures or mudras – and each quality has a personification in a Dhyani Buddha who incorporates a colour, a symbol an element and a season.
Bodhgaya is where the Buddha is deemed to have received enlightenment. However, his influence in the surrounding areas has resulted in a trail of amazing Buddhist monuments and institutions. The skill of brick making in this region led to a distinctive architectural vocabulary of corbelled arches and brick vaults. – which has generated a gentle and timeless architecture that we reflect in the project through shaded courtyards and arched verandahs and gentle waterbodies with the Bodhi tree creating a fulcrum.
Embodied symbolic qualities of the Buddha
The symbolic qualities of the Buddha are embodied through gestures or mudras – and each quality has a personification in a Dhyani Buddha who incorporates a colour, a symbol an element and a season. Each space in the hotel has its own mudra and is designed to express the emotion and qualities of that mudra.
Buddhism resonates throughout the environment of the hotel
For example, the Spa symbolizes Bhumisparsha Mudra or “One with the Earth”
The associated colour is Blue, the symbol of the Thunderbolt while the element is water and the season Winter. These symbols and colours have been incorporated into the design of the spa to evoke the emotion of the mudra. This has been done with each public space to ensure that the qualities of the religion are alive in the project and the deeper tenets of Buddhism resonate throughout the environment of the hotel.
Bodh Gaya, where Lord Buddha is deemed to have received enlightenment, is one of the holiest and oldest pilgrimage sites for Buddhists. Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims and tourists from around the globe visit the city annually.
Spread over 5-acres, not far from the Mahabodhi Temple (one of the four holy sites related to the life of Lord Buddha), the Hotel in Bodh Gaya responds to the religious tourism in the region – designed as an ode to the historical roots of Buddhism in India.
