Built-heritage inTranquebar

Tranquebar is an old danish settlement, 100 km south of Pondicherry, in Tamil Nadu. It is now called Tharangambadi. Today, much heritage conservation work goes on here. The Neemrana group of hotels began to restore a dilapidated house some years ago. The 'Bungalow on the Beach' is now a heritage hotel.

The Bungalow, the Fort Dansborg and the waters of the sea in the serene environment of Tranquebar create together a very special experience.

The old bungalow facing the sea & the fort was adapted for re-use as a hotel by the INTACH pondicherry team . This has become the starting point for more restoration work also by a Danish foundation. Now, several more houses have been restored in Tranquebar.

Francis Wacziarg, Co-founder of Neemrana hotels believes that the interest in restoring heritage properties has been steadily increasing in different parts of the country. Earlier, people built a new house where the old one crumbled. Today, they want to consider converting it into a hotel. "We get about three proposals a week.” (Ramakrishnan, The Hindu Metroplus 2006)

Amongst the old maps of Tranquebar, Peter Anker's map gives a vivid picture of the Fort and the street patterns that were originally planned. Here is a link to the Old maps of Tranquebar and to the history of this town on the Coromandel coast.