RAJARHAT NEW TOWN
Design in Action Area I, New Town
Action Area I is where New Town actually began, and it shows, because this part of Rajarhat has a kind of settled, lived-in quality that the newer action areas still have not quite caught up to. We work here regularly, across both the HIDCO high-rise blocks and the AL, BL, and CL plotted houses, and what we find is that clients here tend to be more considered, more specific, and often more willing to invest in doing a space properly rather than quickly. Being close to Eco Park, City Centre 2, and Tata Medical Center means people here have chosen this location deliberately, so the design brief usually reflects that.
Start a project in Action Area I, New TownThe homes in Action Area I, New Town
The housing in Action Area I splits pretty cleanly into two types. The high-rise HIDCO blocks tend to have fixed structures, limited natural light in interior rooms, and shared society rules that govern what you can and cannot do to the facade or common areas. The plotted AL, BL, and CL houses are a different conversation entirely, because ground-up design or full renovation is possible, and we can plan from the slab up rather than working around an existing layout. Both types need different planning approaches, and we know both well.
What we plan for here
Kolkata's humidity and the four-month monsoon are the starting point for everything we specify here, from waterproofing details on terraces and exterior walls to the materials we recommend for joinery and finishes that will not warp or bubble over time. In the high-rise blocks, daylight is often the central problem because some units face inward or have deep balconies that cut the light badly, so we plan around that early. For plotted houses, drainage and site levels during monsoon need to be sorted at the foundation stage. Society or HIDCO rules on facade work and structural changes are real constraints we account for from the start.
WHAT WE DO HERE
Our work in Action Area I, New Town
Services
By home size
WHY STUDIO CONTOUR
A local studio for Action Area I, New Town
Our studio is based in New Town, so Action Area I is essentially our backyard, which means we are not estimating travel costs or scheduling site visits around long drives. We have worked in these specific blocks and plotted pockets before, we know the local contractors and suppliers, and we understand the HIDCO norms that trip up studios coming in from Salt Lake or central Kolkata. At the end of the day, proximity translates directly into more regular site supervision and faster problem-solving on the ground.
QUESTIONS
Design in Action Area I, New Town
Structural walls in HIDCO blocks are generally not to be touched, and many societies have rules about floor finishes, balcony enclosures, and plumbing changes. We check the specific society bylaws before we draw anything, so you are not committed to a design that then gets rejected by the building committee. It saves a lot of back-and-forth.
Yes, and that is actually the more efficient way to do it, because interior planning decisions like room proportions, window placement, and built-in storage should ideally feed back into the architecture drawings before the slab is cast. We do both together, or we can pick up interior work after a shell is ready, depending on where you are in the process.
A standard 3BHK interior fit-out runs roughly four to six months from design sign-off to handover, but the biggest variable is material procurement, especially imported tiles or customised modular units that have lead times of six to eight weeks. Monsoon season also affects on-site work, so we try to plan structural and civil work before June if possible.