Craft-y Ideas

By Chirag Sharma
Photography: Courtesy Amalgam

A touch of quirkiness often commands a second look. We bring you a bouquet of simple trendy interior accessories and accessorizing elements that periodically revisit traditional art and craft practices…

In a country so vast and endowed in its regional arts and crafts, designers often tend to zero in on lesser known or lesser exploited craft traits; thus unleashing a whole new bandwagon of goodies that rejuvenates mass aesthetic and resuscitates waning craft.

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Amalgam in Delhi, a design firm specializing in lifestyle and accessory design, represents a blend of convention and modernity exploiting natural materials and time-tested craft techniques. Combining the tactility of precious, semi-precious and coloured composite stones with the precise, yet fading craft of inlay, Amalgam emphasizes design as a customized craft.

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The studios’ workshops are based in New Delhi and Agra, where the craftsmen are oriented towards innovating with materials and adding to their competencies through the implication of technology, in a bid to cater to all ranges: from coloured composite to semi-precious stones, and from traditional patterns to trendy modern interpretations.

A lot of similar exercises are noted across the spectrum where hobbyists, design enthusiasts and designers too have walked this well-tread path. Our features have carried such examples too in the past.

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So, what is the bottom line? Simply that in most exercises, design is viewed as an integration of function, need/ want with a style quotient and urbanity that seems to pitch product sales. Colour and pattern, and technique and retro style are being reinvented and packaged anew, redefining the contemporary Indian aesthetic with the craftsman at the helm; maximizing his skills to fit the contemporary idiom.

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The sad part; however is that although the range of products spans lifestyle accessories, viz., coasters, trays and other home ware, as well as furniture, the craft becoming an integral aspect of pure design is lesser explored and still leaves a vast field open, waiting to be played. Any players?