Monday, August 9, 2010

The Shaheen Bagh,Dehradun

A post that has been put off for a long time due to the difficulty in sorting images and finding the best ones. A resort which we visited some months back in dehradun and had a nice and wonderful vacation. Hope this refreshes all my readers minds and enjoy the monsoons ...

Dehradun, in the foothills of Himalayas, is always a welcome escape from Delhi, especially in the summer when the capital's temperature soars above 45 degrees. Shaheen Bagh stands out as a great escapade to the Delhities.

Last summer we had a quick escape to the foot hills of the Himalayas, an idyllic retreat. The Shaheen Bagh is a Boutique resort in all sorts and the present owners are Mr Arun Gupta and Ms Sandhya Gupta. The interiors have not been changed by them and it remains the same as the past owners had maintained it.

Arun is an avid wild life photographer and spends hours chasing "the perfect" photo of the various birds that flock the area. I spent hours discussing and learning the finer points of photography from him. Sandhya, the beautiful and perfect hostess, makes sure that you are comfortable and holds classes for small children in the locality in the afternoon. She spent time playing with our daughter, Gayatri, while my husband and I prowled the grounds for photos.

Shaheen Bagh was previously owned by Alpana Khare and Bikran Grewal, both involved in the international publishing world having lived in London and having travelled regularly to Europe on business. Grewal is a passionate gardener and ornithologist and Alpana trained as a graphic designer and is a decorative painter, both are inveterate collectors of antiques.

They have travelled from the streets and bylanes of Fort Kochi to Spain, France, England and Afghanistan for the collection of the antiques. Their travels have helped them in a remarkable assemblage of furniture and botanical prints. The botanical prints framed shows the couples love for nature. They named their English styled cottage 'The Shaheen Bagh'' - Falcon's garden.

There is a vast living hall at double height and a huge library on the gallery that runs round three sides of the hall.Lovely hall and the sit outs and the huge bedrooms and pools and the gardens beckons me once more to be there...




View of the garden from the verandahplants welcome you on the steps leading to the entranceon to the side of the steps you can relax here in the gardenfront view of the entrance ,
the verandah has got lot of seating options,amongst plants and antiquesantique wooden phoenixa beautiful swing and the shadows welcome you in the morninga tea there was a blissRelax here ..beautiful grill and patterns and plants hangingcandles,antique vessels and lotus floating are all in the verandahas you enter form the verandah in to the main hall,on to the sides are the two beautiful rooms.
the blue room adorned in blue
the green room in shades of greena view of the main hallthe antique seaterthe dining areathe kitchen has tiles collected personally by alpana and grewal from different places of the world and wooden work areadining area,subtle light enchants me botanical prints and mirrors everywhere
sit out portion and grills
outside the main hall,facing the hills you have various seating options,to warm your senses and have teadoesnt this mesmerize you?the shadows?
the stairs coming down to the swimming pool area
the swimming pool where we had quality timeif you are not swimming,pl relax ,put your feet high and bask in the warm glorythe garden area,where i took umpteen shots,but its difficult to showcase all the images..just the walk areathe master suite where we stayed,the sofas were plush and cosy
shadows on the centre table

botanical prints on the walls,orchidsthe fire area in the master suite
the master bedroom with afghanistan kilms,srilankan boxes,big four poster bead and amazing shadows



the head board in the master suitethe lovely bath area,with green marbled area and ducks all around and some flowers,look atthe pool outside ,its fish pond..


these ducks accompany you while you take your bath
Do visit here and enjoy your time as we did...
For more information please visit here



Hope these images brought you into a different world,if so please comment and let me know...

All images clicked by Lakshmi Arvind ,except the overview of the resort and where not mentioned in the photograph are all images of the site shaheen bagh
please dont copy images nor save them

For more infomation,please do visit my other blog:here
will be updating more within a day






Thursday, August 5, 2010

Flowers and Flickr Friends Part 8

"Friends are flowers that never fade",I like this quote a lot

Todays flickr friend is my Dearest friend,Silpa Harish.Its through flickr that i met her and its over a year before i met her and we still retain the warmth and friendship through mails and comments...

I felt compelled to have a hobby says Silpa and I'm glad I chose to pick my husband's camera and start clicking around and about the house.

I have found friends, friends for life and an appreciation of little joys and the beauty in the mundane. Everyday is, now, a celebration of gratitude and creativity.So nice to have been written like that .Its very true that she loves all the simple and mundane .It is visible in her images.Its so nice to see that she brings beauty in a single flower ,rather than so many things around the flower for a composition..

Silpa is a freelance writer from Mumbai ,lives with her husband and two children and a pet dog a recent buy,all makes her family,thts what she says...

enjoy her images and appreciate..
in pursuit of peace:now that we have a pot of frangipani in our balcony, I'm hoping there will be more arrangements with flowers around the house :)
bedside stories, : like I said, fallen frangipani arranged on a fallen leaf is an instant pick me up and fuss free pot pourri on my bedside table.

some cheer, : vying for attention amongst everything on the table.



all things little, :- essentially, a leaf person, flower arrangements in my home are few and far between. our home usually wears the colour 'leaf green.'
kindness, :- collected by the roadside on my morning walk if you could call walking the daughter to the school bust stop that :) simplicity and colours has always been the essence of any kind dressing I do, be it doing up the house or dressing up the kids or making me look good.
happily pink, :- in our rented apartment in Mumbai. that would be the first pot of plant we bought after our wedding, and the hopeless romantic that I am,we bought it on our second wedding anniversary!

All images courtesy:Silpa Harish
visit silpas photostream here