Featured Indian store: Sanskriti Lifestyle, Pune

I live in Pune, and I am often ashamed that I get around so little. Perhaps busy schedules and a demanding toddler are lame excuses, but here I am conveniently offering them to you. However, I did manage to get out and visit Sanskriti - and was happy to strike it off from the top of my 'interior stores to visit' list, thanks to a sudden trip to Koregaon Park's ABC Farms (more on this later). Well, I'll have you know that I was not disappointed - from colonial furniture to antique Indian implements, paintings and home accessories, this store is like a Wonderland for all you interior-freak Alices!




The store is run by Sonali Pingale and her family, and they tell me that their furniture is made from old, seasoned teak wood, rosewood and mahogany, which they get from old homes & havelis that are being brought down. Some pieces are replicas of old designs. Says Devika, Sonali's daughter, "The designs are classic and timeless. Our focus has been old colonial furniture. Traditionally this was always made in hardwoods such as teak, rosewood & mahogany. A lot of the furniture is genuinely old, restored painstakingly by our team of trained and highly carpenters and polish people."


The store is not only about the old. For their Home Decor selection, they have a collection of traditional Indian handicrafts that have been contemporarised for today's modern homes. Traditional brassware from Tamil Nadu, wood carvings from Gujarat, enamel work from Jaipur, and many other traditional forms of Indian artistry are re-designed into mirrors, photoframes, candlestands and table accessories.





They also have a great range of garden furniture, and I love their lawn displays, like this one.

Liked it? Let me know! If you know of more places to add on my "Decor store" list, do tell me :)

Featured Store: Tribal Monsoon

This is Monsoon season in India, and here's a bit of lovely furniture for us to curl up on during the rainy days. It comes from 'Tribal Monsoon' , an online store that is 100% committed to the Fair Trade Movement, and that's all the more reason to feature them here.


The range includes luxury bedding, unique furniture, decorative pillows and accents and home decor sourced from South Asian countries. If you are based in the US, South America or Canada, this store is just the place for you to source all your South Asian decor from.



I particularly loved their warm-hued wall-hangings and luxury bed spreads like this one.

House tour: Residence with a Kerala touch

I couldn’t help but fall in love with Kerala, God’s own country during my vacation to Wayanad. The lush green hills, never ending tea estates, the lakes and waterfalls were enough to make me go green wondering why HE chose Kerala to put in all the elements of paradise and not Bangalore!


When Swetha of Vistaar Associates sent me the pictures of her project with a Kerala flavor, I knew I had to post this. In this project, Swetha attempts to bring in elements of Kerala, the roots of the owners.... Harish and Sharada. The design has tried to optimize space and leave enough setbacks and spaces for green for the house to breathe on all sides. The use of rustic tiles for the flooring and hardware picked from Kerala makes the project all the more ethnic.The double height in the drawing room was to give the space a sense of scale and reduce heat in the room.

The traditional lock called manichitrathazu and hardware on the main door, handpicked from Kochi.

The rustic tiles for the flooring and red bricks add warmth to the decor.

The brass artifacts and traditional furniture bring in the Indian touch.

A niche in the wall adds to the visual

appeal

Handmade terracotta tiles in the sit out ordered from an NGO from Nilambur, Kerala.

Finally, the lush green garden to enjoy a cup of coffee or a leisurely stroll.

This project looks completely ethnic, a refreshing change from the contemporary decor. What do you think of Swetha's project? What's you favorite pic of the post?

The numbers tag

Patricia from ColoursDekor tagged me with this numbers tag, and I have procrastinated long enough. With my work load finally getting a lot lighter, here I am getting down it, and I have to tell you that I thoroughly enjoyed putting this together! Of course, I am not as good as she is with Photoshop :) so please bear with me if the images are a tad too amateur!

Okay here goes:

1. One God, who takes care of the whole world.He gave us one Sun, and one Moon to mark our days and nights! He also gave me one beautiful daughter :)


2. Two pairs of feet...to walk together on life's path. Sometimes slow, sometimes fast, but always together!

3. Three years ago, Johanna was born. We went from being a couple, to a family of three!

4. Four chairs at our table, where we sit, eat and connect at the end of the day.

5. Five precious years of graduate college - the unforgettable years of fun, laughter and smiles. They sure have given me a lot of memories!

6. Six years and four months since B and I got married!


7. This is an interiors blog, so there are seven things I am eyeing for my home right now ; an old fashioned Christian altar, a Warli-painted wall, a baitak, a colorful cart (the kind that street vendors use; more on this in a subsequent post), a wall with retro movie or Broadway memorabilia, innovative storage and a daybed.

8. The number of hours I get to spend with my daughter every day - eight. Lucky me!

9. Those nine months of pregnancy that taught me to slow down and be very patient! :)...but still did not prepare me for the demands of motherhood ;)

10. In Sep 2008, Shashi and I launched The Keybunch. ..heavens! is this the tenth month already? Jai Ho! :)
I don't have a pic of the two of us...the last time we met we both forgot to get a pic clicked :P so this will have to do!




So, get down to it Kala, Priya, Ketchup Girl, orange jammies, Priti, Lakshmi, Judith,Asha, Maina (one of our very first followers), and Le @HC and give us those numbers, 'cos you are tagged!