Breathing new life into a 120-year-old royal mansion

Conservation architect Akhila Udayashankar tells the story of how the Jayalakshmi Vilas Mansion in Mysuru is returning to its former glory

Among the plethora of sightly buildings I admired in Mysuru, there was one whose quiet decline I had been witnessing for years. A part of the University of Mysore’s ‘Manasa Gangothri’ campus, the Jayalakshmi Vilas Mansion (JVM) had been lost as a building of little importance; a monument not old enough to be conserved as vintage and not new enough to be valued as useful. 

But anything but disinterest ailed my mind whenever I took an amble in its direction. The mansion, even in its state of disrepair, was a landmark that reflected Mysuru’s cultural and architectural evolution from a time when the city was expanding beyond the royal fort walls. Constructed in the Palladian style, it featured symmetry and classical Roman facades interjected with neoclassical windows, presenting a palace masquerading as a villa with peak dignity. 

I grew up in Mysuru, and was an active witness to the magnificent palaces and beautiful historical buildings across the city. They all seemed still and inanimate on the outside, but to my senses, they spoke loudly and euphoniously, in an eloquent language I wanted to learn.

And so when I went to college, I opted for architecture and specialised in conservation architecture. 

The beginnings

The mansion had four wings identified directionally (the north, south, east and west blocks), with three of them (other than the south wing) connected by a glass bridge. Its Corinthian and doric columns spoke an elegant strength redolent of Roma; Italian marble flooring a variety of robust finesse, and intricate Hindu motifs in its pediments, an exuberance of delight. Some design components were reminiscent of the grander versions in the Mysuru palace, perhaps to maintain stylistic continuity. 

Work had begun on it in 1901 and completed in a blinding five years. It was a wedding gift for Maharajakumari Jayalakshammanni, the eldest sister of Maharaja Krishnaraja Wodeyar IV. The mansion was constructed with modern materials like steel beams, perhaps a first for the time. But at the same time, it also boasted traditional craftsmanship, such as structural wooden joists, lime stucco work, and exquisite wood carvings.

It once housed administrative offices, visitor entertainment spaces and living quarters for the royal family. In the ’50s, the building and all 3,500 acres of its estate were sold to the University of Mysore, transforming it into an academic hub. In 1972, parts of it were repurposed into a folklore museum, housing one of Karnataka’s most important collections of ethnographic artefacts. 

Up until a few years ago, the mansion lay neglected. But then, something happened that shook the foundations of apathy in the public mind. A part of its west wing collapsed. 

Suddenly, the need to restore it surfaced with an all-new urgency. Soon, the University of Mysore dutifully began seeking the right candidate for its restoration. As luck would have it, a few mutual connections led to a collaboration between the university and Heritage Matters (HM), who offer consultancy services in the field of architectural conservation. And when HM performed the initial inspection, the US Embassy at Chennai also got in touch with the Deccan Heritage Foundation India (DHFI), with whom I was employed. The embassy wanted DHFI to pitch potential heritage restoration projects that they could fund.

When Harish and Bina Shah Foundation (HSBF) visited Mysuru and understood the Wodeyar context, Harish was convinced of the scale and the potential of the project, and gave an extremely generous grant. He felt it would thrive as a cultural hub — a space for learning and experiencing Mysuru’s rich cultural heritage. The Jayalakshmi Vilas Mansion became one of DHFI’s biggest restoration projects undertaken in India.

A sleeping beauty 

Restoring a heritage monument is a delicate exercise in love. It needs to be undertaken with enormous patience and gentleness — like tending a sapling. Stephane Bolch Saloz, co-founder at Deccan Heritage Foundation (DHF), put it best when he said, “Let’s wake this sleeping beauty up!” And we went to work. 

Soon, as a tripartite agreement was signed between the University of Mysore, the DHFI and the two donors, we commenced the restoration of the west block and the beautiful ballroom in the north block. We also hired a team of professional consultants and employees, including collection managers, art conservators, subject experts, and photographers. A temporary storage was created and objects were shifted from the south block to the room.

We then reconstructed, over one room in the west block, a Madras terrace roof — a style of construction using bricks, lime mortar and wooden or steel beams. Such roofs are durable, sustainable and rooted in native architecture. They are also effective in combating heat and humidity. 

Then, through June and July of 2024, we expedited the building’s monsoon readiness by erecting monsoon sheds over three blocks and completed the site-level barricading. One of the most primary uses of this is, during monsoons, we require these blocks to be rainproof, and sometimes, additional storage space is
required to protect rain-sensitive materials. Meanwhile, our photographers got to work documenting the conservation of the vintage photographic print collections, while
structural repairs of the roof in the ballroom of the north block took place in full swing. 

By October last year, as a part of our outreach programmes, we had begun conducting workshops and other events in an effort to connect with both parents and children, and demonstrate what we were envisioning for the space. By December, structural works on the east block had commenced. Last month, we even hosted a poetry-reading session for an 11-year-old group full of Kannada literature enthusiasts. 

In less than two years, our restoration work covered landscaping, setting up of a world-class museum and a cultural centre, and a lot more. Little by little, I could see the old lady standing back up, like a young patient rising back up on the crutches of tender care. 

Mansion to museum

A mansion can of course never be a home without the people and the things that contain meaning to those people. A building becomes a monument when it houses something of the collective consciousness that led to its existence, and indeed the existence of all architecture.

And hence, what started as just building restoration grew into a museum in the making. We found that the existing collections extant in the mansion were already unconventional. It had none of the predictable artefacts and archaeological discoveries that populate other Indian museums. Instead, it was home to very different worlds of daily-use objects; a diverse ethnographic collection that showcased rituals, traditions and the daily lives of the people of Karnataka and the surrounding regions. Its significant artefacts include Yakshagana ornaments, elaborate costumes and jewellery used in Karnataka’s traditional dance-drama performances, and a variety of traditional puppets — garudi, togalu, keelu, and sutrada gombe — representing the region’s deep-rooted storytelling traditions.

As I walked the different spaces of this sprawling home, I often thought about what Helen Philon, DHF’s founding trustee, meant when she said she saw Karnataka as “the epitome of mingled cultures, integrating and carrying forward the best parts of all the cultures the Deccan region witnessed”.

I saw this reflected in how seamlessly the palace combined different worlds, bringing together a dialogue between the West and the East, but even more importantly, how India represented the best of both. I second her assertion that the vernacular informs the more structured views in the mansion, how the carvings you see on the columns take you to a different world, and how for instance the baskets on another floor inform you of the people’s everyday life. I found myself inspired daily by this constant dialogue between civilisations, ideas and concepts.

Not long ago, I took over the role of heading the JVM project, and at once observed what a spectacular collection it contained of wooden objects, including bhuta urus (spirit figures), intricately carved wooden chariots and guardian deities that captured the spiritual-scape of rural Karnataka.

Everyday objects, such as aliguli mané (chenné mané) game sets that I also grew up playing with, and indigenous appliances like the shavige mané highlight traditions of the local community, including food preparation and social customs. I found that JVM offered an in-depth exploration of the cultural and artistic heritage of this massively diverse southern Indian state. 

In fact, I am also continually reminded of what Saloz also said about the importance of recognising the building as part of the city and making it work in a way for it to be part of its everyday life.

Mission for the future

The scale of the project has only grown since we started considering its details and the magnitude. So we are working hard to meet the 2027 deadline. For it to become a museum that meets global standards, a lot of work has to be undertaken. We have been talking to several people and entities to understand how museums
work, and what technologies we should use
for collection and museum management. This goal itself is my daily inspiration.

When we looked at the collections, we realised that JVM needed a bigger and more diverse team to understand the backgrounds of things in its possession. We now have four teams: the architectural restoration team looks into building restoration; the collections team undertakes accessioning and detailed research into each category and object and identifies storage solution systems; the digital imaging team images each object as per evolving requirements and details; and the material and object conservation team evaluates the current condition of objects and identifies the ones in critical need of restoration. 

Madras terrace roofing and lime concreting continue. The ballroom will be ready soon. It will host large-scale events so the public can
begin to engage with us even before the mansion becomes a full-fledged museum. Our conservation team is working on sculptures, puppets and paintings relentlessly among other things. Our digital imaging team is documenting not only objects but also processes as stunning visual stories.

With multiple spaces at the mansion, we hope it can host various cultural events including music, dance, theatre, book launches, lectures and seminars. In one part of the mansion, we plan to set up a library on the Deccan. 

We don’t have sufficient state-of-the-art labs for conducting research and restoration of museum objects in this part of the country. So we are planning a whole wing to be dedicated to material and object conservation. A laboratory for restoration of historic objects is also being planned. 

A full circle

It is customary in building restoration to get to work with exhibition designers and nothing more. This is considered par for the course. But the JVM project is anything but par for the course. 

Not a single day goes by that I don’t get to work with people of varied backgrounds and skills that motivate me to outdo myself. It is truly remarkable that so much talent and specialised skill have converged. And it is an opportunity that does not knock on one’s door often, if at all. Therefore it is no surprise that I feel a great sense of pride, but with it, also a tremendous sense of responsibility. I am truly living the dream.

(As told to Sourabha Rao.)