Location: Mustique, St Vincent and the Grenadines.

Architect: Patterson Dublanc Designers.

The Mughal Villa and Landscape Vision is a 32-acre private island in the Caribbean, with a villa inspired by the architecture of the three great Mughals: Akbar, Jahangir, and Shah Jahan. The villa is planned around a central courtyard with scented gardens forming jali patterned beds. The private suites are linked to the main building by colonnades clad with hand-carved sandstone perforated jali screens, creating a natural climate control. The decorative motifs are floral and are manifested throughout the interiors and expressed in the skills of master craftsmanship utilizing marble, stone, fibrous plaster, timber, and bronze. The landscape vision was influenced by the Mughal tradition, with various species of flowering plants selected by beauty, color, and scent. Guest accommodation consists of five secluded cottages with their own private gardens linked to the main villa and dining pavilion. The beachside swimming pool is lined in blue marble surmounted by a restored white 16th-century marble pavilion decorated internally with bolsters and cushions. The Mughal Cascade and Observatory is linked to the paradise walled garden. It forms a staircase rising 70 meters flanked by scented gardens with a marble pavilion (Baradari) elevated on a plinth on the upper level with niches decorated with pietra dura. The pavilion is clad in perforated marble panels (jalis) for privacy, solitude, and silence, with only the sound of water trickling over the fish scale cascade panels and the scent of exotic flowers and vegetation. On the same elevation and via a bamboo tunnel is the observatory which houses a large telescope. This has a 20-inch lens and is totally computerized to be operated remotely and capable of relaying selected interplanetary images in color to the various screens in the villa and guest cottages. The observatory facility is intended to be shared with schools and colleges throughout the region by internet. The marble was sourced and carved in Makrana in Northern India, where the marble for the Taj Mahal was mined. The finished carved components were transported by truck to Bombay containerized and shipped from India to the West Indies. The team that made it possible included specialist structural and hydraulic engineers, artists, and craftsmen from India and construction expertise from the West Indies.