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A new kind of subdivision is emerging in Indian River County, combining the best of New Urbanism with ancient architectural principles dating back to Roman and Vedic times.
“Harmony with nature that supports the well-being of the people who live there is at the heart of what we do,” said AIA’s Richard Bialosky. He is working on the development of Mandala Village with his partner David Ederer, an architect and Transcendental Meditation practitioner. .
Mandara Village stretches two-thirds of a mile along North 53rd Street just west of 58th Street and has approximately 200 residences, including condos, townhouses, cottages, single-family homes, and rental apartments, as well as a small shopping center. It is included. , a 100-room resort and convention hotel with a 14-acre lake and swimming lagoon adjacent to a mile-long boardwalk.
“The retail area will include a natural foods market with a cafe, and the hotel will also have food and beverage outlets,” Bialosky said. “We want that part of the community to be convenient, enjoyable and walkable for residents.”
The village also includes a community hall, a wellness center and spa, a meditation and yoga pavilion, and the surrounding grounds are planted primarily with native Florida plants, which reduce irrigation water use and eliminate toxic Eliminates the need for fertilizer.
The sustainable subdivision, which aims to be net-zero, will have walking trails and be decorated with a number of themed “pocket parks” with enclosures to encourage people to gather. Biarosky cited tea plantations as one possible theme.
“Surprisingly, our hotel will be the only convention hotel in the county. Although it is not suitable for large conferences, it is perfect for many smaller meetings and conferences.”
“This is a really interesting project,” said Andy Sobchak, the county’s planning director. “There’s a little miniature of downtown with grocery stores and hotels. It’s these types of projects that we always try to promote. Having what people need in their neighborhoods reduces traffic. Masu.”
The 85-acre mixed-use development has been approved by the county Planning and Zoning Commission and the County Commission, and Bialoski hopes to receive land development permits this spring.
“We’ll do five or six months of infrastructure and then we’ll go vertical and build the housing in two phases,” he told Vero Beach 32963 last week. If his timeline holds true, residents would move into village-like subdivisions in late 2025.
“The idea is to create a community where people don’t always have to get in their cars and drive somewhere else to get what they need,” said former Vero Beach City Council director of planning and zoning. Honey Minase said. Committee members who are enthusiasts of Mandara Village. “I think if there was a village in their neighborhood where people could just walk around and enjoy the quiet environment, it would be very popular.”
“We have not yet officially advertised the project, but we already have about 800 people on our interest list, who regularly check in with us,” Bialoski said.
The community was approved as a type of planned development known as Traditional Neighborhood Design.
Two existing traditional neighborhood design communities in the county are Windsor and Point West. They are reminiscent of small town and city life, when homes and businesses were within walking distance and neighborhoods had a distinct identity and style rather than being buried in an endless city. Suburban sprawl.
However, Mandala Village takes an even bigger step towards the future and the past by applying classic psychological and spiritual design principles not only to the community but to all individual structures.
As an example of the design principles governing the community, Biarosky said each home will be oriented toward the cardinal point of the compass, with the front facing east towards sunrise. Roman military engineers and Vedic architects, dating back several millennia to Rome, believed this situation was favorable. To happiness, happiness and success.
Village houses also have functional rooms in specific locations, such as the kitchen in the southeast corner of the house, which ancient seers judged to be most beneficial, and the exact rooms believed to promote good health. A ratio will be set.
According to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, famous for teaching meditation to John, Paul George, and Ringo, feng shui, a common method of reorienting your home and furniture to improve your life, is based on ancient Vedic It originates from structural science and is said to have discovered one of the most popular methods since then. Meditation groups around the world.
Maharishi also founded Maharishi Vastu Architecture, which modernizes “the traditional Hindu architectural system based on ancient texts that describe the principles of design, layout, dimensions, ground preparation, spatial arrangement, and spatial geometry.” It was revived.
The encounter with this system changed the course of Bialoski’s career, leading him to his current project. He said it will be the country’s first full-fledged community designed as per Vastu architectural principles. Bialoski came from a “developmental family” that included his uncle, who taught him how to draw floor plans when he was in third grade, and his parents, who gave him books about Frank Lloyd Wright.
“I always knew what I was going to do,” he said. Biaroski earned his degree in architecture from the University of California, Berkeley in 1969. Berkeley is a renowned school of influential contemporary architects and currently ranks as the world’s best public university for architecture.
Starting a successful practice in Santa Barbara, California, he and his partners designed and subsequently developed a wide range of projects.
Then, in 1988, a busy Santa Barbara architect and TM meditator with 14 employees and many projects stumbled upon Maharishi’s modern interpretation of classical Vedic architecture.
“That’s what I was waiting for,” he said. “There was this magic element of being able to create an environment for optimal evolution, rather than something that would interfere with the harmony of life. This could be a standard dollar-driven development.”
Leaving the traditional practice in the hands of his partners, he began designing according to higher principles and began looking for a place to build a Vastu architectural community.
He visited his parents when they moved to Florida and realized that the Vero area was a place where he could build the harmonious and evolutionary community he had envisioned.
The project was delayed by the Great Recession and the 2008 housing bust, but in 2018 Bialoski and Ederer purchased land on 53rd Street and began designing Mandara Village.
Then the pandemic hit and work was delayed again, but the project is now moving forward with strong support from the county.
Information about the project can be found at mandalavillage.com.
Correspondent Garry Boulard contributed to this article.
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