Category Travel

Fontainhas – a unique living heritage

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By Neena Bhandari

Fontainhas, the Latin Quarter of Panaji (Goa), is a unique living heritage. During my sojourn in this charming neighbourhood, I meet members of ancestral Goan families, who take pride in preserving their heritage and care for their traditional homes. Through the voices of its residents, beginning with Jack Sukhija, Partner at WelcomHeritage Panjim Inn, I trace the past of this distinctive cultural enclave, widely regarded as unlike any other in India, and examine what is needed to conserve it for the future.

Jack Sukhija, partner at WelcomHeritage Panjim Inn in Fontainhas, recalls growing up in Goa in a tight knit community with plenty of green open spaces, and uncrowded streets and beaches.

“It was an idyllic childhood. Everyone knew each other, which sometimes had its downsides”, quips Sukhija, who hails from a business family. At 19, he stepped up to help his father put one of the small businesses, that had gone bankrupt, back on the rails. This encouraged him to join the family in running the heritage hotel business.

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Goa’s green design warriors Part I – Dean D’Cruz

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Dean D'Cruz with his wife Alice. Photo Credit: © Gabriella D'Cruz

By Neena Bhandari

Sydney, 02.08.2024 (The Hindu): In a burgeoning real estate market, three eminent architects – Dean D’Cruz, Gerard da Cunha and Arminio Ribeiro – go down memory lane and reflect on how Goa has transformed from a tranquil haven into a bustling hub as tourism and construction take centerstage. They underscore the need for environmentally and socially responsible policies and planning to foster sustainable communities, where cultural heritage and modern development can coexist in harmony.

Dean D’Cruz, co-founder and principal architect of Mozaic, recalls waking up to a rooster crowing and the aroma of curries simmering on woodfired stoves in his uncle’s home, where the extended family lived together. It was a cohesive existence that permeated their village, Saligao, in Goa.

He has meticulously restored his 105-year-old Portuguese-style villa, nestled in a quiet green corner of Saligao, where I meet him on a rainy evening. The home has been progressively restored from about 50 years ago. A staircase leads to the balcao (a porch) that overlooks a courtyard garden. The main verandah features columns crafted from single pieces of Burma teak and the flooring is adorned with Spanish-Portuguese tiles. Inside, two spacious living rooms with original oyster shell windows with pointed arches, flank the entrance. The use of shells is now banned, instead frosted glass can be used in the pointed arches.

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Goa’s green design warriors Part II – Gerard da Cunha

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By Neena Bhandari

Sydney, 02.08.2024 (The Hindu): Gerard da Cunha’s quest to discover his roots led him to Goa at the impressionable age of 19. His maternal grandparents had moved to Lahore and his paternal grandparents to Mumbai. His father worked in a bank and so they lived in various cities, wherever he was posted. During summer vacations, they would visit one set of grandparents, but never Goa.

He instantly fell in love with the place, especially it’s architecture, and decided to make Goa his home as soon as it were possible. After graduating from the School of Planning and Architecture in Delhi and working in the national capital for few years, he felt it was time to set up his architectural practice in Goa in 1984.

He was intrigued by the Indo-Portuguese house, which harmoniously blends the double-storey rural Portuguese house and the traditional Goan house designs. He began documenting and photographing these houses, and published the seminal Houses of Goa book written by Heta Pandit and Annabel Mascarenhas in 1999. Around the same time, he held an exhibition of Goan houses in Panjim, which travelled to Lisbon and Porto, Mumbai and Delhi.

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