In Chettinad, the holiday comes with homework

Explore Chettinad's Kalai festival, where heritage meets immersive learning in art and architecture, transforming holidays into enriching experiences.

I expected a holiday. I got a lecture.

We sit cross-legged on the floor, notebooks open, as architect Sashikala Ananth pulls a measuring tape out of her handbag with the delight of a conjurer. She begins to measure a wooden pillar at AR House, its surface worn smooth by centuries of use. As she runs through a series of calculations with her audience, the logic behind the compelling visual rhythm of Chettinad’s 200-year-old mansions becomes evident: they are built on precise math.

Architect Sashikala Ananth with Darshini Ashok, Director of Public Relations at The Park, measuring a wooden pillar | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

At a time of doom scrolling, intellectual flattening and 30-second attention spans, Kalai, The Chettinad Art and Architecture festival feels like a quiet pushback. Curated by The Lotus Palace, a part of The Park Hotels group, the festival spans four days of information-packed lectures that demand attention.

Chettinad’s stark, arid landscape and maximalist mansions turn into a classroom, where architects, historians, artists and locals teach. Instead of photo ops and drive-by tourism, we attend power point presentations on design in darbar halls lit with stained glass, walk through symmetrical courtyards to understand rainwater harvesting and explore temples carved out of rock to decode iconography.

The Lotus Palace Kanadukathan  | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement