CP’s People Tree shuts shop after 30 years: ‘No sense of unfinished business’

That is the first disclaimer that pops out of their now-defunct website bearing a 2002 copyright: “We cannot ensure complete uniformity across a batch – on the contrary, we revel in the differences that exist from piece to piece.” That was the founding ethos of People Tree, of providing a space for personal expression free of commercial and governmental interests.

In the late 1980s, Sidhu and Sen were fresh graduates from National Institute of Design and looking for a new art project. A batchmate of theirs, Ajmal, goaded them to accompany him on a trip to Manali, but for that they needed money – so they bought cheap shirts from the streets of Connaught Place, painted them on the ground outside a clinic owned by Sidhu’s grandparents in Regal Building, and sold them for Rs 100 apiece. The trip was now funded, and, incidentally, they had begun a venture that would soon grow in size and ambition.

“We needed that kind of honest place for expression as government projects we did back then didn’t reflect people’s real stories,” says Sen. The trio’s designs were motivated by their politics – Sufi verses, feminist slogans, anti-capitalist quips.

One day, two men who had just attended a Narmada Bachao rally crossed them painting t-shirts and asked, “What the hell are you guys doing?” One of them was Rahul Ram, future bassist of Indian Ocean, and the other was Ashish Kothari, co-founder of environment advocacy group Kalpavriksh. They all began discussing the agitation, and decided to design t-shirts, banners and educational pamphlets to support it.

As word of mouth grew, they sought a screen-printer in Delhi who could help them replicate their t-shirt designs in larger numbers. “We started experimenting with many handcrafting techniques, and began working with NGOs,” says Sidhu. “We wanted our designs to incorporate folk traditions, but also evolve them, to make them cool for young people,” says Sen.

Eventually, doors officially opened, and an entrepreneurial collective focused on upcycled and handmade fashion began, with a bookstore at the back curated by Ram.

On Saturday afternoon, old friends and expat patrons were trickling in and out of the shop, with Sidhu behind the counter laughing and reminiscing with many of them, while the handler, Raju, listed inventory: jewellery, wallets, kurtas, pants, art prints, and much more.

The pandemic was hard on business, and the advent of online shopping didn’t help. Sidhu says, “Our purpose wasn’t to develop labels, it was just to create an artistic space for people to come in.”

Sen says they never mind if people come and go without buying anything, adding, “All things have to end. Only corporations are made to last forever. What’s natural is for things to rise, flourish, and eventually die. I accept that and have no sense of unfinished business with The People Tree.”

Loyal customers, meanwhile, mourned the passing of this enterprise, many of them young college students for whom a ‘hippie’ aesthetic was at once inspirational and intimidating. “Back in undergrad, it was like a routine – coming here after protests, hanging around, maybe buying a book, then heading to a coffee house for a cutlet and dosa,” says Jaishree Kumar, pursuing her Master’s in journalism at Jamia Millia Islamia.

Many encountered the store by chance, strolling through the white colonnades of Connaught Place, and kept going back – like Vartika Rastogi, who discovered it in 2016 as a literature student at Hindu College. “I bought a recycled watch with a band made out of cotton strips, presumably left over from a tailoring job,” she says. She still has it in London, where she works as a bookseller.

The studio has also inspired generations of artists, one of whom, Navleen, was visiting on Saturday. She knew Sidhu from NID and when she started making earrings in 2007, decided to sell them through The People Tree.

The future of the store is unsure, though parts of it will continue online at peopletreestudio.com. Some items are being given away, some sent back to producers, some carried back to Sidhu and Sen’s home in Goa. “I will ask the carpenter to trim the edges of our signboard so I can take it back home,” says Sidhu, smiling at a cat drawn on the yellow wall next to her counter. “Though there are many things, of course, that we can’t take with us.”