Visalam

KVAL Ramanathan Chettiar built Visalam at Kanadukathan for his eldest daughter, Visalakshi. It never became the lively family home it was meant to be and saw only occasional gatherings. Half a century later it passed to CGH Earth, who restored it with Chettinad tile makers, weavers, carpenters and stone workers, partitioning the vast halls into guest rooms and otherwise leaving the interiors as they were.

The house holds fifteen heritage rooms, Chettinad Rooms and Chettinad Deluxe Suites, with high ceilings, period furniture in Burma teak, and floors laid with handmade Athangudi tiles from a village ten kilometres away. Walls and pillars carry the local plaster of ground eggshell, lime, palm jaggery and seashell, finished by polishing with egg white.

Meals move between Sapadu Shala, the garden breakfast cafe, the pool cafe and the Terrace Grill at dinner, and guests can cook alongside the house cook in the Chettinad kitchen and eat off a banana leaf. There is a swimming pool and a garden, a working handloom unit a couple of minutes' walk away, and cycles and bullock carts for the village lanes. Tiruchirapalli airport is 85 km, Madurai 90 km.