Volume 10. Issue 10 . October 2016 Rs. 25/-
THE
INSIDE TRACK CONNECTING THE DESIGN COMMUNITY Now view our web edition at www.theinsidetrack.in
Cover Story
F
rom once being dominated by big-box retailers the home décor scene in India is undergoing a serious change with few creative minds leading the charge. As The Inside Track Celebrates its 10th Anniversary, we present you with a list of best creative entrepreneurs and their brands which have created a buzz in the décor industry. Desi Jugaad The idea of ‘jugaad’ highly ingenious re-use or re-purposing of ordinary, everyday items into useful products has long threatened to become a trait ubiquitous to India. Candid street photography by travellers exposes this truth with regular frequency. Guess then, it is the spirit of jugaad itself which makes entrepreneurs in the country take up this impluse and transform it into an art form! Owning the old crude upcycling trend and giving it expert finishes of colour, texture and multiplicity of use, taking it from the low-end of aesthetic scale to the chic point. Desi Jugaad, born in 2015, is a resident of this realm. The team is perennially inspired by the local spirit of jugaad, blending it with a globally-relevant capability at transforming the idea into visually stunning, professionally-polished products. The firm’s collections of
Creative Entrepreneurs Shine In India Creative, quirky and classy 2016 is all about innovative minds. lamps, furniture pieces, pouffes, ottomans, framed mirrors, storage chests, stools, clocks, magnetic boards, and photo frames, all belong to the earthy, distinctly-Indianmotifs design trend that took over popular consciousness in the country a decade ago. It has, in fact, become a market that is difficult to stand out in. Desi Jugaad does so by sticking religiously to its core idea, and joining it in happy matrimony with delectable patterns - think floral, fish, birds, tartan, paisley, chevron, and more. It is a deft game of balance they play, thankfully really well! A great example here is the ‘Roped with a Twist Ottoman’, created out of old tyres and wrapped in a tight jute sari, now a piece so fashionable it is easy to forget where it came from. The ‘Wok The Talk Stool’ and the ‘Balti Stool’ highlight the team’s talent with visualising basic-shaped regular home items as
Desi Jugaad: House of orange chest upcycled from set of old drawers
Roped with a Twist Ottoman by Desi Jugaad
having more purpose than intended. Throw in high-sheen bold colours, slickly-polished base materials, and a great ergonomic manoeuvre, and voila! Beyond the environmentfriendliness of the upcycling, Desi Jugaad products’ colour scheme is a stand-out. The schemes celebrate vibrancy and hue-specific psychological benefits at home settings. So the ‘House Of Orange Chest Upcycled’ is a mellow drippy orange, pink and cream, a perfect bedside companion to de-stress with. Or the old paint-brush lamp, the bristles still soaked in different oily paints, shooting out wisps of whimsical rays that can perk up any corner of a home or store. While its colourful, patterned upholstery-fitted pieces are the epitome of quiet elegance, its upcycled metal creations stand strong without falling over on that precarious edge - products created out of greasy old metal parts. Take, ‘Motor Away - Floor Lamp’
- “with the headlight aesthetically amalgamated with the body of a bicycle, adjustable height, a speedometer and a bell that goes ‘Tring Tring’”. It is a fantastic piece that showcases the team’s vision with restorative design as well as its keen eye for aesthetics. Desi Jugaad creates original products sure, but it also offers to restore old furniture items, or even make-over segments of a home. Its motto, after all, is ‘Restore. Reuse. Re-love.’ Desi Jugaad is a perfect playing ground for fashion merchandiser, Kritika Gattani, and former IT research analyst and permanent jugaadu-expert, Ishita Gupta. Together they channel a mutual love for fabrics and colours in a handcrafted universe, along with a fond belief in ‘yesterday’ - “What we see is what we can relate to hence we can proudly say, Desi Jugaad has been conceptualised from yesterday.” continued on page 2