Matrimandir Gardens

The August 2025 Newsletter of the Matrimandir highlights the work done in the Garden of Bliss, where the five bowl-shaped fountains are being illuminated, and the work for manifesting the Garden of Youth is underway.

The January 2025 issue of Auroville Today focused on the aftermath of Cyclone Fengal, which breached the Lego block dam separating sections 1 and 2 of the Matrimandir Lake.

As an offering to the Mother on Her Birthday, the Wealth Garden, one of the 12 gardens of the Matrimandir, was opened on 21 February. The flower of the Wealth Garden is the Water Lily, which Mother named “Wealth”.

On November 25, meteorologists of the India Meteorological Department observed a deep depression forming in the Bay of Bengal. Their initial forecast was that the depression would weaken and that a cyclone would not form, as the depression was moving at the unusually slow speed of 3 kmph, far below the typical cyclone speed of 10-12 kmph.

On September 17th, at the occasion of the pre-full moon, the Matrimandir executives organised a ‘confluence’ in the Peace Area of the Matrimandir Gardens, inviting Aurovilians, Newcomers and friends to a Coming Together in a consecrated atmosphere in silence, sound contemplation, walking, observing, listening, with simple offerings of flowers and candles under the Banyan Tree.

On Sri Aurobindo's birthday, August 15th, the Garden of Light, one of the twelve gardens of the Matrimandir, was declared open for all.

Gajendran Karunanidhi suddenly passed away on July 1st due to cardiac arrest.

April 2024. Trucks are driving up and down, day and night, to transport earth dug up from the second section temporary hillock opposite the Town Hall.

Auma is a second-generation Aurovilian, born to Indian and French pioneers, Marie Babu and André Tardeil. While she raises her third generation child, she shares insights with us about what makes Auroville unique to her.

In our July issue, we reported on recent developments on the site of the Matrimandir lake. These included the excavation of section two of the lake, which will be 250 metres long, more than twice the length of the existing test lake.

Judith joined Auroville in 1971. Here she talks about her journey.

While preparatory work for the expansion of the Matrimandir Lake has started, two new experiments involving the Lake are underway. One is pumped hydro; the other, underwater water storage.

In the mid 1960s Roger Anger wanted to know the location of the geographical centre of the city to be. He brought a map to Mother and she indicated a spot.

Himal Jaiswal came to Auroville 45 years ago as a seven year old boy. Approximately two years ago he started working in the Matrimandir gardens.

Every so often a story comes along that captures the spirit of Auroville in a unique way, bringing to light aspects of its deeper purpose of transforming the world we live in to create a spiritualized life on our planet.

I do not want people to feel they have to read cover to cover, the purpose is to get a feel of it. At the end of the book are tiny mandalas, an endless world.

Situated at the periphery of the Matrimandir gardens is the site of the Garden of the Unexpected, a garden for children for when their parents are visiting the Inner Chamber, or for those days when the Inner Chamber is open only to children from all the schools in Auroville and the surrounding bio-region.

On August 15th, 16th, and 17th, the illuminated fountain-pond at the Matrimandir Gardens was once again converted into a stage for a theatre presentation of ‘Usha and the Dawns to Come’.

On the night of April 19th – 20th, 2022 a special milestone was reached with the completion of the installation of the waterproofing liner in the 7.5 metre wide water channel, one kilometre long, which now surrounds the Matrimandir gardens.

Recently, the process of finalizing the designs of the next four Matrimandir gardens to be constructed – Light, Life, Power and Wealth – was completed and work on Life and Power, the two smaller gardens, will begin in a month.

The small amphitheatre in the Matrimandir Gardens was once again the site of a dramatic exploration of a spiritual search. A few years ago Aryamani staged excerpts from Sri Aurobindo’s Debate of Love and Death, from Book Ten of his epic Savitri.

Fifty years ago the Mother described her visions of the Inner Chamber of the Matrimandir. A seed was planted, a Divine impetus was sent forth… The Lotus that is the Matrimandir would soon begin its slow emergence from the deep red earth of Auroville.

The Mother’s stay in Japan between 1916–1920 was not only of profound importance for her spiritual explorations, but might also have had a big influence upon the development of Auroville.

Paolo Tommasi passed away in JIPMER on July 16th due to the COVID-19 virus. He had just turned 92 years. Paolo was born in Ancona, Italy in 1928.

Auroculture (Helga Ahy – born Pirk) left her body on 10 February at Marika Home. She was 86 and had suffered a major stroke in November 2014 which left her partly paralysed, with a weakened heart and hardly able to swallow.

The Matrimandir executives are starting a new international open design call for the next four gardens around the Matrimandir, namely Light, Life, Power and Wealth.

My name is QurratulAin Contractor and I am 27 years old. I come from Mumbai and have been living and working in Auroville since April, 2016.

In early January, the team supervising the process announced that a final design had been decided upon for the Garden of the Unexpected at Matrimandir (see AVToday November, 2018).

Looking at some of the old issues of Auroville Today, it’s fascinating to see how some of the articles could have been written just last week.

Dear Auroville Today, I would like to bring to your attention a mistake in your recent article on the Garden of the Unexpected (AV Today, August 2018).

An innovative process to design a new garden close to the Matrimandir is underway. What is it trying to achieve? What does it involve?

A mixed-media outdoor exhibition of works by Auroville artists was held in the boulder garden of the Matrimandir in January.

Michael Neville, a long-term Ashramite, passed away on 22nd January. Michael, known as ‘Michael Redbeard’, ran the early Auroville transport service and taught in the first Auroville school.

On April 01, 2009, John, Elumalai, Pierre and Srimoyi took charge as executives of the Matrimandir. On July 31st, after more than 8 years of dedicated service, their term of office is coming to an end.

On the evening of February 3rd, Aurovilian V. Gnanavel of the Matrimandir Nursery left his body due to a stroke caused by high blood pressure.

Two and a half years ago, Ireno Guerci presented a photo exhibition in the Unity Pavilion on ‘Matrimandir and the Park of Unity’. The photos were a selection from the many thousand photos that he has taken over the past 30 years of a place that is very close to his heart.

Alan Rusbridger, the retiring editor of The Guardian newspaper, recently wrote an article on climate change. One of the things he noted was that newspapers don’t always cover the most important topics because “they may be occurring too slowly or invisibly for the impatient tick-tock of the newsroom”.

Two years ago, in its February 2013 issue, Auroville Today reported on the manifestation of the first three gardens of the Matrimandir. The Gardens of Existence and Consciousness were ready, and work on the Garden of Bliss would be completed by the end of the year.

Esteemed Sir, I feel obliged to inform you that last night, while perambulating around the periphery of Matrimandir Gardens, I happened to see a Pterodactyl Indica, a large prehistoric bird of rather unpleasant habits, grazing daintily off a Hibiscus flower.