A bank employee and nature lover, Sreejesh T. from Kakkuni, a small village in Kozhikode, has built an eco-friendly house with years of hard work. This unique home is decorated with more than 6,000 toys.
Talking about how he collected these toys and what inspired him, he said, "The house contains more than 6,000 toys. I started collecting them initially from my relatives and neighbours, but they weren't sufficient. So, I began visiting scrap yards in Calicut on holidays and collected toys from there. I selected the best ones, which were used and discarded. Inside the toys, we put cement, which is not just for aesthetic purposes. The cement inside the toys takes the load of the building." Elements used to build the house, such as the mud tiles, are made from reused materials that Sreejesh repurposed as a stand against the throwaway culture. His main idea was to establish a house without disturbing nature. "The house is built on compacted soil and a ramped road, mixed with nutritious soil taken from our site. The soil is pressed before the bricks are made. The roof is made of a cement shell, which minimizes the use of steel. The floor is made of oxide," he said while discussing the different materials used to build the house. Further, he added, "I wanted to build an eco-friendly house without disturbing nature. All the bricks used to make the house are made from our own soil, mixed with cement in a fixed ratio. All the materials come from the soil." For Sreejesh, who has been constantly supported by his wife and kids during the building of the house, the project is more of a memory. When asked what makes it a memory, he said, "All the walls in the house are taken from old houses that are now being demolished. By using those tiles, we are practising a culture of preservation." With a pond in the basement and a guest room, the toy house was built with the intention of eliminating plastic pollution. "All the architects involved in building the house were very careful not to disturb nature. We wanted to avoid plastic pollution and create a memory," he said. "In summer, the house stays very cool, so it does not create a significant issue. It can also be seen as an innovation and something different from the huge concrete buildings," he said, referring to how the house acts as a cooling system and represents a significant invention for mankind. (ANI)
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