Siddhartha Das combined traditional Indian crafts in refurbishing an office that steers clear of the glass and steel stereotype.
Incube Business Centre, located in New Delhi’s busy Nehru Place commercial district, is easy to spot. It is perhaps the only island of green in a sea of grey. But that’s not the only thing different about this corporate office. Potted plants line the entrance but the pots aren’t the usual plastic or earthenware ones, but in stone with a leaf-motif embossed on its pale yellow surface. Inside the lobby, the décor combines elements of traditional Indian crafts, not your usual office fare.
Delhi-based designer Siddhartha Das explains — “When I started work on redesigning the lobby a few years ago, the idea was to steer clear of a stereotypical look. The lobby was conceived of as a place for informal meetings by the various companies within the business centre. We wanted a look that was modern Indian, though not specifically ethnic. ”
‘Ethnic’ is a description that Das, who works a lot with craftsmen, does not like, preferring, instead, ‘contemporary craft’. “People usually shy away from having someone like me, who works with traditional craft, design a contemporary office space,” he says.
Given only a month to transform the 1,000-sq ft lobby, Das says that the main constraint was that “I had to create a feeling of space”. Luckily for Das, who is primarily an exhibitions and museum designer, the client, Punj Essen, gave him a free hand.
Das brought in 20 artisans from four states to work on the decor — among them the traditional blockmakers of Uttar Pradesh and weavers from Bhagalpur. Carved stone pots were sourced from Jaisalmer, while the suspended ceiling lights are a result of long discussions on a workable CFL technology with Phillips. Eventually, the project took five months to execute.
A leitmotif of Das’s design for the lobby interiors is the champa flower and leaves. The motif can be seen all over the lobby, from the flower pots to the AC grills and the glass panel at the far end of the room separating a private meeting area.
More From This Section
“We chose the champa flower as a uniquely Indian motif,” says Das. Almost every element of the decor was custom-made — from the door handles to the teak-wood switchboard, the water tray and the lamp shades in chanderi fabric.
A wood-panel reception desk faces orange sofas (“light sofas,” says Das, “so as not to crowd the space”) neatly aligned against the wall. The wall has a single adornment: six wooden squares with the champa motif in brass inlay.
“This lobby was badly lit earlier, and there was barely any sunlight. So we made the windows larger, and put in silk blinds so the light would filter in,” says Das. He has used glass minimally to cut out the cold corporate feel, opting instead for wood, stone and handloom.
Thankfully, with a budget of around Rs 2,500 per sq ft, money was not a constraint. Even so, Das was cautious. “I picked Jaisalmer stone for the floor which costs about one-tenth of Italian marble. Whatever money we saved, we used to pay the artisans well,” says Das.