Architect Periyannan Karuppiah is a native of Valayapatti. He underwent his schooling in this historical town of Pudukkottai. His entire childhood days were interwoven with the chettinaadu region and chettiar culture, as he had the opportunity of residing close to his native. He then moved to Chennai to pursue his graduation in Architecture.
He finished his graduation and then post-graduation continuously from School of Architecture and Planning, College of Engineering - Guindy campus, Anna University in 1993. After five years of work experience in Architectural, interior design and construction firms, he started his own practice.
APDO – the Architectural firm provides comprehensive design services from scratch to shape; start to completion. Specializing in residences, residential apartments and group housing, the firm handles hotels, entertainment hubs, institutional, commercial and public buildings. Geographical location of their practice is around the five towns – Pudukkottai, Karaikudi, Madurai, Trichy and Thanjavur besides projects in Chennai and other metros. Their clientele are pre-dominantly nagarathars apart from builders, various institutions and corporate.
Architect Periyannan is a Fellow member in the Indian Institute of Architects, Associate member in the Institute of Indian Interior Designers and Member of the Council of Architecture. He is also an executive council member of the Indian Institute of Architects-Tamilnadu chapter. He visits many schools of Architecture as visiting faculty, for guest lectures and as external examiner.
He is a part of - THE REACH CHETTINAADU - an architecture and culture revival effort by a group of individuals to bring the chettinaadu community back to its roots; to bring the chettinaadu region back to its glorious days; to bring the life back to the chettinaadu villages in a natural transitional phase; taking chettinaadu to the next phase of its evolution.