What each direction governs, and where things belong
Vastu Shastra reads a building the way a chart reads a birth: as a set of directions, each with its own element and its own work to do. Almost all of it comes down to one instruction — keep the north and east light and open, keep the south and west heavy and closed. Everything below is that idea, applied room by room.
🧭 Find your direction with the compass →Wealth and opportunity
Keep it open, light and uncluttered — this is the side money is said to arrive from. A living room, a study, the drinking-water source or an underground tank all sit well here. A safe placed here should open towards the north.
Avoid: A heavy store, a toilet, or a staircase pressing down on this side.
Clarity, prayer and health
The most sacred corner of a plot, and the one Vastu asks you to protect above all others. The pooja room, a meditation seat and the drinking-water source belong here. Keep it the cleanest, lightest and lowest-built part of the house.
Avoid: No toilet, kitchen, staircase, storeroom or heavy machinery — a blocked or cut north-east is the defect Vastu treats most seriously.
Health, learning and recognition
The main door, wide windows, a children's study. Morning light reaching inside is the whole point of an east opening, so keep this side unobstructed.
Avoid: Tall trees, a high boundary wall or stacked storage that blocks the morning sun.
Energy, digestion and drive
The kitchen — with the cook facing east while cooking. The gas, the geyser and the electrical panel all belong to this corner.
Avoid: A bedroom (especially a child's), an underground water tank, or the pooja room. Fire and water in the same corner is a classic defect.
Stability and rest
Weight belongs here: wardrobes, heavy furniture, a bedroom for the elders of the house. Build this side taller and heavier than the north.
Avoid: Leaving the south hollow, open or lower than the north; and the main water source.
Strength, control and relationships
The master bedroom, with the head of the bed towards the south or the west. This should be the heaviest, tallest and most enclosed part of the building.
Avoid: A toilet, an underground tank, a borewell, a pit or a descending staircase. Never leave the south-west lower or lighter than the north-east.
Gains and reputation
The dining room, a children's bedroom, storage or the staircase. An overhead water tank sits well towards the west or south-west.
Avoid: Large unshaded glass that lets the afternoon sun heat the building.
Movement, guests and support
The guest room, a grown daughter's room, the store for grain, and a bathroom if one is needed on that side. Things placed here are said to move on — which is exactly what a guest room is for.
Avoid: The master bedroom, and long-term stock you actually want to hold.
The breathing space of a building
Keep it open. The old courtyard house was built around exactly this idea — light and air reaching the middle of the home.
Avoid: A staircase, a lavatory, a well, a heavy pillar or a beam crossing the centre.
This is the general body of Vastu guidance — the part that is the same for every building. A full Vastu assessment is a different exercise: it studies the actual plot, the shape and slope of the land, the placement of every opening, and the horoscope of the person living there, and it is done on site. Treat what is above as a way to make good decisions where you have a choice, not as a verdict on a home you already love.
Vastu Shastra is the classical Indian discipline of building — laid out in the Mayamatam, the Manasara and the Vishvakarma Prakash, and visible in temple architecture long before it was applied to houses. Its logic is climatic as much as it is ritual: in the northern hemisphere the north and east give soft light and the south and west take the hardest sun, which is why weight goes to one side and openings to the other.
The two are read together in practice. A direction that is difficult in a building can be handled differently depending on which planets are strong in the chart of the person living there — which is why a site visit asks for a birth chart as well as a floor plan.
Clearing the north-east corner, fixing a leaking tap, moving a heavy cupboard to the south wall and letting the morning sun in cost nothing and are the first things any consultant will ask for. Structural changes come last, not first.