As everywhere else in the world, the social status of home owners in Kozhikode, Kerala, is connected to the kind of house they live in. “But the understanding of modernity in a tier 2 city is not the same as that of a tier 1 city,” says Abul Quassim of Istithi Studio. “This family owned three adjacent parcels of land measuring an acre each, with the one to be constructed sitting between the other two.