Village houses in Vidarbha were built around soil, rain, crops, cattle and family life. Their form came from daily use, not from style alone. A wall had to hold the roof, stay cool in summer, take plaster every year and survive the monsoon.

A courtyard had to handle grain, cooking work, visitors, rituals and children. A roof had to drain rain and keep the inside usable through long, hot months.

These homes show how rural families built with what they had around them, from mud and cow dung to bamboo, timber, stone, tiles, straw and crop waste.

1. The Mud-Walled, Tiled-Roof Farmer’s House

The mud-walled house with a sloping tiled roof is one of the most common traditional village house forms in the region. It was built with local soil, cow dung, straw, rice husk, grass, stone, timber and country tiles. Across Vidarbha’s rainfall zones, the same broad form changed according to local material and weather conditions. In high rainfall areas such as Bhandara and Gondia, the roof and wall finish had to withstand more rain. In Wardha, Nagpur, Yavatmal, Washim and Chandrapur, the moderate rainfall belt produced houses with thick earthen walls, stone plinths and pitched roofs. In Amravati, Akola and Buldhana, assured rainfall areas used similar earthen methods but adjusted them to soil and farm residue available nearby. These homes were usually built on random rubble stone foundations, which helped keep the mud wall away from direct ground moisture.

The wall was often made in layers instead of one continuous mass. In the Wardha case study, adobe walls were made of processed white soil mixed with dung and wheat straw in a 1:1:4 ratio. Each layer was around 0.30 to 0.45 metres before the next layer was added. The wall tapered from the lower part to the upper level, which gave it weight at the bottom and made the upper wall lighter. The floor was usually compacted mud, finished with cow dung and mud slurry. The roof was supported by timber trusses and covered with country tiles or Mangalore tiles. The house worked because its materials came from the same farming cycle that supported the family.

2. The Courtyard Wada House

The courtyard wada was a larger and more organised form of rural housing. It was usually connected with joint families, landholding families and older village cores. The most important part of the house was the courtyard, known in many homes as the angan or chowk. Rooms were arranged around or near this open space, allowing the family to separate public, semi-public and private areas. The entrance often led to a front zone, while the courtyard carried domestic and social activity inside the house. This made the home inward-facing even when it stood close to a narrow village street. The outside could look plain, while the inside handled most of the household’s daily movement.

The courtyard was not an empty area. It was used for drying grain, sorting produce, cleaning utensils, preparing food, conducting rituals and holding family events. It also helped bring light into the inner rooms without opening the house fully to the street. In older villages, where streets were narrow and houses were attached to each other, the courtyard gave the family working space inside the property. During marriages and festivals, the same space could become the main gathering area. In agricultural households, the courtyard also connected the kitchen, storage rooms and cattle-related work. This form shows how traditional houses were built for both family privacy and daily labour.

3. The Gadhi or Raised Landlord House

The Gadhi house was a distinct form recorded in Lonsawali village of Wardha district. It was described as a very old wada-type house built on a height, with the raised form linked to the position of the landlord family. The house had a front yard, a central courtyard and a back yard. It was a ground-plus-one load-bearing structure built with timber, grass, clay, bamboo and stone. Its thick brick walls and timber roofing covered with country tiles matched the material pattern found in Wardha’s traditional homes. The house was not just larger than ordinary village dwellings. Its raised position and layered plan made it a visible marker of status inside the village.

The Lonsawali study recorded that the village had around 135 dwellings, with 40 percent requiring maintenance, renovation or structural attention. The same study noted that its documentation was supported by mapping, measured drawings and interviews with villagers, but it did not publish direct resident quotations. The Gadhi house showed the weakness of many old houses as well. Timber roof members had started decaying, termite damage was reported, and part of the back section was demolished. The family’s later preference for new building materials reflected a wider movement away from older construction. The house still remains important as a record of rural hierarchy, landholding and the way architecture once displayed family position. It also shows why large old houses became difficult to maintain when families changed, and repair costs increased.

4. The Front-Courtyard Agrarian House

The front-courtyard house was a practical form used by farming families. Unlike the inward courtyard wada, this house opened more directly towards the village street. Its front court acted as a working buffer between the house and the lane. In Vidarbha villages, this space could be used for cattle feeding, keeping tools, cleaning utensils, drying small farm produce and receiving visitors. It also allowed the main living room to remain less crowded during daily tasks. The front court was important because rural life did not fit neatly inside closed rooms.

Work moved between the entrance, the street, the kitchen and the storage area.

In Lonsawali’s documented house typologies, the front-court house appeared as one of the individual house forms. It was smaller and simpler than the Gadhi or larger wada houses. It usually had a low plinth, which became a problem during heavy rain. Waterlogging and water entering the house were recorded as issues faced by residents of this type. It shows that traditional homes were useful but not free from faults. The same layout that made the entrance useful for daily work could also expose the home to rainwater when the plinth was too low. The front-courtyard house stands as one of the clearest examples of a home built around field work, cattle work and street-facing domestic activity.

5. The Cluster House With a Shared Courtyard

The cluster house was built around shared living rather than a single isolated family unit. In this form, three to four families could live together around a common courtyard. The houses were attached or closely placed, with the shared open area handling daily work. The Lonsawali study identifies cluster houses as a separate type where routine activities were done in the common courtyard. Food preparation, grain drying, washing clothes and cleaning utensils took place there. The same area also supported festivals and small family marriages. This made the courtyard both a work area and a social space.

This kind of housing reflected how older villages grew without formal layouts. Streets were narrow, houses were attached, and growth followed the main village spine. The village became denser towards the centre, while the entrance areas had lower density. In such settings, a private open space for each family was not always possible. A shared courtyard allowed families to use space efficiently. It also kept daily work visible and collective. In Vidarbha’s older village cores, this form was tied to kinship, household expansion and the practical limits of land within the settlement. The cluster house shows that rural housing was often about shared use rather than individual ownership alone.

6. The Gond and Madia Mud-Bamboo House

The Gond and Madia house belongs to the forest-linked settlements of Gadchiroli and nearby tribal areas. Gadchiroli district has a large tribal population, with Gond, Madia, Pardhan and Kolam communities listed among the major groups. The district’s official culture profile records Gondi and Madiya as languages used by tribal communities. Traditional houses in these settlements used mud, bamboo, wood, clay tiles and local materials. The roof was commonly built from wood and bamboo available nearby, with clay tiles used as roofing material. Mud was used for walling, flooring, platforms and cooking spaces. The house reflected forest livelihoods, cattle space, rainfed farming and collection of non-timber forest produce.

In the Gadchiroli architectural study, Mendha Lekha is documented through sketches and photographs of housing, kitchen areas, wall design, roof construction and cattle space. Mud platforms were used to keep utensils and support the chulha for cooking. Wall designs included floral patterns around openings and building surfaces. Bamboo and cane joinery details were also documented. The house was usually modest in scale but closely tied to daily work. Vidarbha’s tribal housing pattern cannot be understood only through the farmer’s tiled-roof house of Wardha or Amravati. The Gond and Madia house adds another rural form where bamboo, forest access, cattle and kitchen activity defined the building.

7. The Raised-Plinth Riverbank Mud House

The raised-plinth riverbank house was built for villages exposed to flooding or heavy rainwater flow. A documented example from Sirasgaon Korde in Amravati district shows a house built on a raised plinth of about 1.20 to 1.50 metres above ground level. The village stood near a river and had earlier faced yearly flooding. The raised random rubble masonry helped protect the mud wall from being washed away by rainwater. Basalt stone was used in the foundation and plinth, while the wall above was built using cob construction. This type shows how traditional builders adjusted the house to the site. It also shows that mud construction was not used blindly in every condition.

The wall mix in the Sirasgaon Korde case used cow dung, wheat straw, dried congress grass and mud in water. The grass acted as reinforcement inside the load-bearing wall. The wall was plastered with mud-based materials and finished with white soil available nearby. The roof followed the familiar pitched form supported by timber members and covered with country tiles. Small door and window openings were made within the mud wall. The floor used compacted earth and cow dung finish, as seen in many other traditional homes. The raised-plinth house is important because it proves that rural construction responded to flood risk, soil condition and available stone before the house was built above ground.

The traditional village house was never a single design repeated across every district. It changed with riverbanks, forest settlements, village cores, farms, cattle and family structure. Its history can be read in plinth height, roof slope, courtyard position and wall material. A small front-courtyard house tells a different story from a raised Gadhi house. A Gond or Madia mud-bamboo house tells a different story from a Wardha wada. A riverbank mud house tells a different story from a compact cluster house in a dense village centre.

Many of these forms are now less common in their older condition. Cement blocks, concrete roofs, metal sheets and modern finishes have entered village construction in a major way. Old mud walls require regular care, timber can decay, and termite damage can make maintenance costly. Migration and smaller households have also changed the use of large family homes.

Yet the old forms remain useful for understanding how rural life once organised space. They show that architecture in villages was connected to labour, crops, animals, water, storage, festivals and family position. The old house was a living unit of the village economy, not just a shelter.

Similar Article:

1. 101 Best Travel Destinations in Vidarbha

2. 6 Great Temples of Vidarbha

3. 10 Ecological Hotspots in Vidarbha