Quirky by design

That’s just one example of how the 40-year-old designer finds inspiration and humour in the colour and chaos of her environment — jaunty parrots reading fortunes on the pavement inspire her to create stylish diaries and Handy Aujar becomes the name of a DIY tool box. “Isn’t it fascinating that images of gods and goddesses on the walls of a building can stop people from vandalising them? That’s a design solution to a tricky problem,” she says.

Eleven years ago,when Thakur set up her studio,Design Temple,she wanted to create a design vocabulary unique to the country. “In contemporary design,signage is used to identify things — like an ICU or a restaurant. But India,unlike Japan,does not have its own symbols though they can be be found in its street culture. I refine that Indianness,add a tinge of humour and present it to the world,” she says.

The studio’s new line,Animania,is travelling to Milan next April to take part in the Salone Internazionale del Mobile,also known as the Milan Design Week — the first Indian studio at the prestigious design fair. The idea was to come up with a fun iconography for Indian animals while advocating the need for conservation. Design Temple invited seven artists from Argentina,Sweden,Japan,the US and India for the project.

The result is post-modern images done in bright colours — an imperial eagle in brilliant red,captioned “In Garuda We Trust”,the brilliant green of the ghariyal or the tiled graphic image of a Bengal tiger woven into a carpet. “It is just a quirky way to say that if a tiger rug is available,why kill the animal?” she says. The Mumbai exhibition showed how such images can pep up your living space — woven into rugs,on playing cards or furniture. “For Milan,we are creating an exclusive line of Animania furniture. For example,a large vanity mirror inspired by the image of a peacock,” says Thakur.

This is not the first time that the studio will take its work to an international audience. Its first exhibition,“India Indigenous: Works of Accidental Artists”,was held at Loggia dei Mercanti,Milan,and showcased its quirky design language. Thakur presented a series of posters,products and graphics that celebrated the everyday art of India. A poster of an urban Indian woman wearing a sheelam,a traditional unstitched undergarment of Kerala,that resembles the present-day thong. Or rolling boards with images of paranthas,rotis and naans.

Thakur counts among her biggest achievements the show they put up at the Victoria and Albert Museum,London in 2009 . “Thousands of people came to the show and saw our work. Our biggest challenge was to present contemporary India without ignoring its culture.” Indian cinema was represented by an image of a Yakshagana dancer,his face convulsed with emotions. The BPO industry got a nod with an installation of mannequins placed alongside antique telephones.

When did the alumnus of Sir JJ School of Art start getting inspired by everyday objects? As a child,the army officer’s daughter was handed paper and pen to draw while her friends enjoyed their siesta. “I would spend afternoons doodling images of refrigerators,animals and home appliances. And as I travelled with my family to different places in India,I discovered more objects of daily life that spilled over into art,” she says.

The studio she founded offers design solutions to various firms; and is known for using Indian motifs in a contemporary language — the title design of Mira Nair’s film Namesake combined Bengali calligraphy with English alphabets. It did the branding,visuals and marketing communication for Dharma Production’s Wake Up Sid and the government’s AIDS Jaago campaign. It got the World Gold Medal at New York Festival in 2007 for the design of Lights Camera Masala,a book on contemporary Bollywood.

It has taken six years,though,to launch the Animania line of products after Cheerharan. “The recession affected our business like many others and we did not launch any new line. Animania is our comeback,” she says.

Thakur says that multiple projects help the studio break even,though it is not about the money. “For me,success is not monetary. A person in London saw my products in a store,enquired who made it and sent me an email saying that they were funny and made him smile. That made my day,” she says.

After Milan,how far does she want to go with Animania? “It just struck me. I think I could put the Bengal tiger image on a jacket and mock all celebrities who buy fur. That would be some fashion statement.”