Housed within a meticulously restored 115-year-old villa in Moira, Isprava’s Solene is a private members’ club where layered heritage and understated luxury converge with quiet conviction. Set in the languid village of Moira in North Goa, where time drifts like light through banana foliage and the landscape holds its breath in tropical stillness, the villa has been gently reanimated. Solene unfolds as an inhabited archive: a place where past narratives, present sensibilities, and future possibilities coexist in calibrated dialogue, revealing themselves with the intimacy of a well-kept journal. The designers sensitively restored this adaptive reuse project to preserve the villa’s historic soul.
This Adaptive Reuse Design Is Sensitively Restored To Preserve The Villa’s Historic Soul | ARA Designs
Arrival is the first act. The original entrance, preserved in its architectural integrity, opens into a succession of carefully composed spatial vignettes.Designers reimagine the Member’s Lounge—once the family’s “salete,” a formal parlour just off the threshold—as a vaulted repose where vintage silhouettes converse with generous ceiling heights and light tempers the room like a lived-in reverence.A few steps beyond, Bar 507 resides in chiaroscuro: sultry, low-lit, a place where glass, shadow, and the quiet clink of conversation conspire to slow time. Then, with a deliberate and almost choreographed shift, the sequence unfolds into the Orangerie, an airy glass pavilion embraced by tropical verdure, its filtered daylight, and botanical edges framing long, unrushed brunches and afternoons folded into reading.
This orchestration of atmosphere is intentional. Each chamber articulates its own temperament: a distinct cadence of light, material, scent, and sound that steers movement not merely through volume and form, but through felt experience. One moment, the hushed depth of shade holds you; the next, the warm geometry of sunlight washes over you, as if the architecture itself breathes in measured intervals.
Luxury here speaks softly—calibrated, quiet, and tactile. Linen and velvet upholstery wears like second skin. Burnished brass, reimagined in unexpected gestures, such as walking sticks repurposed as door handles, catches fleeting glints of sun. Lace-edged cushions, sourced from family heirlooms and local craftsmen, soften the edges between curated refinement and familiar comfort.
That sensibility permeates every programmatic layer. Nariyal, the club’s restaurant, stages a menu of vibrant comfort, served within rooms that feel both composed and inhabited, where hospitality is both precise and porous. The wellness enclave, carved from the former dining hall, folds fitness and ritual together: a gym, sauna, and cold plunge existing within adaptive spatial memory. The old cowshed now becomes Clementina’s Garden, a shaded outdoor dining retreat animated by umbrellas and gentle breezes.
Even the smallest gestures are given thoughtful architecture. A former bike garage has been repurposed as the Toddlers’ Outhouse, an enclave of scaled joy with child-sized furniture and sunlit alcoves. A nearby pickleball court quietly signals play, a nod to the club’s layered spontaneity.
“Intimate details—the original altar, preserved lounge flooring, and family grotto—anchor the club, while place names like Julia’s Garden and Bar 507 honor the de Souza women, rooting its identity in personal history.”
Despite its vast expanse, Club Solene retains an intimacy born of reciprocity with its context. Its architecture is not insular but woven into Moira’s cultural rhythm. Local artisans, chefs, and storytellers are collaborators, not guests. “Moira, a quiet corner of North Goa, has quietly shifted from an artists’ haven to a retreat for mindful living.” Club Solene adds itself naturally—a community valuing rhythm over ritual and depth over pretense.”
To call it a club is to understate its ambition. “No velvet ropes or rules—just spaces for slow breakfasts, lingering in lounges, and afternoons on airy patios.” It does not seek to dazzle; it disarms. It reads less like a membership venue and more like a shared, evolving living room.
Its constituency mirrors that ethos: a composite ecosystem of homeowners, seasonal guests, local collaborators, creatives, neighbors, and entrepreneurs bound by a shared tempo. The team doesn’t simply program that collective sensibility; they embed it in the restoration itself, choosing to conserve and amplify what was already here rather than overwrite it.
Fact File
Designed by: ARA Designs
Project Type: Hospitality Design
Project Name: Club Solene
Location: Goa
Year Built: 2025
Project Size: 10,000 Sq.ft
Principal Designer: Amey Dahanukar
Photograph Courtesy: Isprava
Firm’s Instagram Link: ARA Designs
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