Godrej One is a new home for India’s iconic global company

Vikhroli, Mumbai, India

Godrej One is composed of distinct, simple forms with deep shading elements and strong accent lines as shown at night.

Established in 1847, the Godrej Group serves over a billion people globally in the consumer goods, real estate, and agricultural sectors. Godrej One unites the company’s diverse businesses in the same building for the first time in its history. Adjacent to a sweeping preserve of mangroves, Godrej One is the signature building within The Trees, a mixed-use development that transforms a former industrial site into a thriving neighborhood two stops by train from the center of Mumbai.

Godrej One is composed of distinct, simple forms with deep shading elements and strong accent lines. Lushly planted terraces soften the modern glass exterior.

Traveling though the building offers a continuous experience with the outdoors and an uplifting sense of perspective and scale.

Large public spaces connect the interior with the outdoor landscape.

An expansive atrium and spacious throughways are filled with light and trees.

The design limits direct sunlight through the glass façade, reducing heat gain and filtering northern light deep into the interior.

“The qualities I was most drawn to in the making of Godrej One were the experiences of space, light, and shadow. The intensity of sunlight makes the places in shade palpable in contrast — one can feel the shape of space in shade in a way I have not experienced before.” — Rafael Pelli, FAIA, LEED AP

Terraces on the building’s fourth, seventh, and tenth floors reference traditional Indian architecture, softening the distinction between the indoor and outdoor worlds. An accessible roof garden shelters the building from unwanted heat gain and evokes connection to the verdant mangroves surrounding the property.

Continuing a legacy of environmental innovation

Godrej Group is deeply committed to sustainability, reflected by its stewardship of the surrounding 1,700 acres of mangroves that are owned, managed, and protected by the company. Certified LEED Platinum, the building’s sustainable design brings creative innovations to life and develops solutions for efficient cooling in a tropical climate. Water is abundant during the area’s four monsoon months, but municipal reservoirs do not supply enough for the subsequent eight months of drought. We collaborated closely with environmental engineers to create systems that store and reuse rainwater, and extract and desalinize brackish groundwater for high-efficiency cooling towers — vastly more energy-conscious than the air-based types typically used in Mumbai.

Ambaji White, a traditional stone used in India’ ancient temples, creates a welcoming oasis in the building’s central atrium.

The building’s shape and orientation reveal sweeping views of surrounding gardens and green space.

“We are a 118-year-old organization. I think this is an amazing physical representation of our culture, our mission, and what we want to do. We use the Sanskrit term antevasin, which means one foot in the past and one foot in the future. So what we are saying through this beautiful new building, is that we are very deep-rooted to who we are.” — Nisaba Godrej, Chairperson and Managing Director, Godrej Consumer Products