Artistically Crafted

By Savitha Hira

Shabnam Gupta

Interior designer Shabnam Gupta blends in touches of deep-rooted traditional crafts into the modern fabric, enlivening a hi-end jewellery boutique with a touch of inherent classiness that instantaneously sets its status and commands its brand positioning.

Shabnam Gupta’s is a style that blends traditional craft techniques into the contemporary idiom to create a space that is bespoke and interactive, without being ostentatious and cold. Here is a designer, who has her finger on the pulse of current trends, but is careful to sneak in a timeless appeal that is distinctive to the ambience and its inhabitants.

A characteristic panache styles her interior spaces; the designer gives contemporary a new meaning by delicately wrapping chic styling around native Indian crafts and traditional techniques in a recently designed jewellery boutique ‘Vistaara’. A privy space catering to hi-profile clientele, the interiors are chiselled around large beams and columns, creating old-world grandeur via partial arches, walls in vintage-styled finishes, decorative carved framework and art deco seating and cabinetry.

While the design elements and colour palette have been kept to a minimum, bling is introduced through baroque-styled Venetian cut-glass mirrors and chair-back tops. Interestingly, simple carved motifs are filled with coloured stones generally used in craft and embroideries; and delicately cut brass-branches simulate a landscape vista as the art installation backdrop, lending the seating area a lounge feel.

Discerningly applied aesthetic elements envelope underlying functionality to evolve a space very unlike a commercial establishment – more a cocoon that fosters indulgence – the ultimate key in the jewellery business.