Hiwali School is a compact rural campus in the Western Ghats that turns a constrained ridge-top site into a sequence of child-scaled learning landscapes. A family of load-bearing brick blocks, a protective water moat, and a zigzag plinth work together to manage monsoon runoff while shaping outdoor rooms, steps, and courts for teaching and play. The porous plan treats movement as pedagogy, and a gently modulated, floating roof brings light and air to robust, low-tech interiors suited to a remote context.
Hiwali School Technical Information
- Architects: PK_iNCEPTiON
- Location: Hiwali, Trimbakeshwar, Nashik, Maharashtra, India
- Gross Area: 355 m2 | 3,821 Sq. Ft.
- Completion Year: 2025
- Photographs: © pranitborastudio
We treated the route to and through the school as the primary classroom, letting circulation host learning and play while simple, durable construction supports a shifting constellation of teaching setups.
– Pooja Khairnar
Hiwali School Photographs
Site, Climate, and Topography: Building on a Terraced Ridge
The school is situated on a narrow strip at the top of terraced farmland, positioned between a mountain face to the northwest and stepped agricultural slopes to the southeast. Access involves a 50-foot climb from the village road, so the project works with the ridge rather than against it. Massing stretches along the contour to minimize cut-and-fill, maintaining agricultural retaining lines as both edge and memory. Orientation responds to valley winds and monsoon trajectories typical to the Western Ghats, using built form to temper exposure while preserving long, transverse views across the slopes.
Hydrology becomes spatial structure. A perimeter water moat intercepts mountain runoff before it reaches the plinth, relieving hydrostatic pressure on the terraces during storms. Inside this perimeter, a zigzag plinth folds across the site to channel surface water behind the blocks and to create a series of landings that double as amphitheater-like pockets. These stepped nodes stitch circulation with occupation, so the path up the ridge also becomes a gradient of places to pause, gather, and learn.
The built volume takes a U-shaped profile aligned with prevailing winds, forming a windward shell that breaks gusts and frames a protected outdoor room along the slope. The open side of the U receives sun and breeze filtered by the roof overhangs and the inter-block gaps, giving the school a calibrated microclimate that contrasts with the exposed ridge outside its envelope.
Plan Logic and “Through” Spaces as Pedagogy
The plan adopts Louis Kahn’s idea of “to and through” by elevating interstitial space to a primary role. Circulation is not residual; it is designed as a sequence of teachable thresholds, stoops, and widened joints where a lesson can start, continue, or be reconfigured. Instead of fixed classrooms, learning happens across a porous field of rooms and in-between areas that support group work, quiet focus, and spontaneous play without strict zoning.
Modular blocks for the office, computer, science, projector, and library are set on a diagonal across the site, increasing the number of cross-grain connections. This diagonal weave creates shortcuts and slow paths, encouraging child-led navigation with multiple entry and exit points. Doors stack or fold to reassign territory in minutes, while the continuity of the plinth allows activities to overflow outward without losing acoustic and visual supervision from a single teacher.
Anticipated growth is embedded in the plan. The diagonal array leaves clear expansion bands toward the mountain, where additional modules can latch onto existing joints without disturbing the working spine of in-between spaces. By prioritizing the connective tissue over the discrete room, the school can densify incrementally while preserving the social and pedagogical value of its shared spaces.
Sectional Tuning, Light, and Air
A gently modulated, floating roof acts as the environmental instrument of the project. Slight changes in height enhance cross ventilation and encourage stack effect, drawing cooler air through shaded edges and releasing warm air at higher points beneath the roof plane. The aerodynamic massing of the U-shape further reduces wind pressure on the ridge, creating leeside pockets where children can gather even during strong seasonal winds.
Daylight is introduced through two strategies. Informal zones receive lateral light through slivers between blocks, where narrow apertures and roof oversails limit glare while keeping air moving. Focused rooms utilize semi-circular courtyards carved from the roof profile, allowing for high, diffuse light that remains consistent throughout the day. This geometry simplifies water shedding in heavy rain and gives each room an identifiable light character that helps children map the building.
Interior volumes tune scale to young users. Ceiling heights vary between roughly 5 and 8 feet, compressing and releasing space to shape attention, support sitting on floors or steps, and soften acoustic bounce. The low zones form intimate bays for reading or instruction; taller pockets accommodate group assemblies and projection without mechanical augmentation.
Tectonics, Materiality, and Flexibility in a Rural Context
Construction relies on load-bearing exposed brick for economy, robustness, and adaptability. The walls accept nails and screws for pin-up, allowing boards and shelves to be reconfigured as teaching needs evolve. Repeatable openings and lintel details stabilize the module, and folding doors convert contiguous rooms into larger halls without introducing complex hardware. The roof is expressed as a separate plane above the masonry, improving air movement at the eaves and offering a continuous soffit as a communal canvas for learning through painting and display.
Floors work as teaching tools. Local stone provides a hard-wearing surface that can be written on during lessons, erasing back to its natural finish. The high plinth is finished with a cow-dung mix, producing a cool, slightly resilient surface suitable for sitting, napping, or group activities in warm weather. These simple treatments acknowledge daily routines, including long school hours and multi-age occupancy, and they reduce reliance on furniture.
A modular construction logic underpins maintenance and future expansion. Standardized brick courses, repeatable roof spans, and a clear water-management diagram simplify repairs in a remote setting with intermittent access to skilled labor. The same rules that make the building legible to children make it legible to builders, aligning form, pedagogy, and construction with the realities of a hillside village school.
Hiwali School Plans
Hiwali School Image Gallery
About PK_iNCEPTiON
PK_iNCEPTiON is an architectural practice based in Nashik, Maharashtra, India, founded in 2015. The firm, led by architect Pooja Khairnar, emphasizes context-responsive, research-driven design approaches that integrate spatial pedagogy, environmental logic, and flexible programmatic frameworks. Their work frequently explores architecture as a social infrastructure, tailored to material and climatic realities.
Credits and Additional Notes
- Client: Give Welfare Organization and Armstrong Robotics & Technologies
- Design Development: Pooja Khairnar, Shantanu Tribhuvan, Swasti Rangani, Harshada Pathrabe
- Working Drawing: Bhavik Chopada, Tanishq Tejnani, Shantanu Tribhuvan
- Detailed Drawings: Shantanu Tribhuvan, Tejaswini Kawale
- Models: Shantanu Tribhuvan, Swaroop Sope
- Graphics and Presentation Drawings: Shantanu Tribhuvan, Shreya Chandsare
- Photographs: pranitborastudio
- Video: Sagar Bondarde (SBFLIXVISUALS)
