Store in focus : Magnolia, Worli.

A classic case of seven year itch this. What else to call lawyer and design enthusiast Maulika Gandhi's decision to hang her black solicitor's coat after seven long years in the profession in favor of the business woman's hat? And she did it with panache too!

Maulika's labor of love is located just off  E moses road in Worli, Mumbai. Amongst a cluster of odd looking buildings in a nondescript lane stands the white, contemporary white facade of Magnolia, the home decor Atelier.

I have stumbled into the store, camera and gear in hand by accident. However it does not  take too long for me to get busy chasing beautiful things in Maulika's store .

A single-seater upholstered in cheery  yellow floral fabric graces the sunny entrance of the store.

At Magnolia the emphasis is on  classic pieces of furniture  and handcrafted objects d'art.  Passion for decor is a key element in designing stock according to Maulika, for whom the entire venture is a leap of faith to begin with. And the collection mirrors that preoccupation very well.

A quirky setting of up cycled, wood and tire furniture 

I notice an array of rough, up cycled  furniture, ideal for a patio or quirky  informal seating areas at home. "We design and create a majority of our furniture. Most if the up cycled pieces are created by us and the main aim is to re-use mundane and ordinary things and turn them into something unique. Plus we used a lot of recycled wood such as teak, sleeper wood etc. This way everyone can do their part in buying eco-friendly products without compromising on the design or aesthetics of their home" explains Maulika.

Another delightful find is the upholstery fabric used by the design team at Magnolia. Scraps of jewel toned Patola sewn together using kantha stitches. A vibrant and interesting touch for that  odd sofa or a set of chairs .

 A sofa upholstered with a patchwork of kantha embellished silk fabric

According to Maulika, using kantha on Patola offers a way of integrating modern living with old handicraft techniques. 

Talking of her future plans Maulika says : 

"Magnolia is a year and half old now. We are still spreading the word about our  flagship Worli store. We have a tremendous response from customers and we definitely have some expansion plans in the pipeline in the making" 

A few other interesting finds at Magnolia among many  also worth mentioning :

Digitally printed home decor and accents  add a dash of whimsy to the house India style and make excellent gifts too.

Vibrant colors combined with geometric prints marry the  contemporary  to the classic.

Stoneware and 

ceramic from 

Auroville  every home can do with....




Where :

83/C, Hansraj Pragji Building, 
Off. Dr. E Moses Rd., 
Worli Naka, Mumbai - 18.
Tel: +91 22-24951020 / 21 / 22
Email: contact@magnoliahome.co.in
Web.: www.magnoliahome.co.in

Check Magnolia out online.

Down but not dirty.

The relative quite  on my desk lately in spite of the enthusiastically penned mission statement earlier, is mostly due to a home project underway at frenzied pace. Yes, am preparing to move yet again... ! Luckily  the move is just to another apartment within the same city.  As the space takes shape over the next few weeks, there will be more to share  until then,  here is a post about ideas. 

Have been engrossed in all manner of things. Floors, flea markets, furniture, paint and the like.
Today's post is going to be about an aspect of home dressing that I never really paid too much heed to until a few weeks ago when rotten parquet became a bone of contention. Three floorings needed to be ripped and relaid.  The humble grounds beneath our feet indeed, only somehow they end up making or  breaking spaces completely.

I grew up in a house  with wildly coloured, wildly patterned mosaic tiles.  My grandfather designed  these himself.  I remember watching him supervise the laying under his strict gaze. This was in the early seventies.  Dadaji, had spent his youth in a Bombay in the throes of art deco craze.  Only  later when I moved to the city myself and saw things up close did it become clear  to me where his love for elaborate mosaic tiles and checkerboard floors came from!

Mumbai or elsewhere, go looking for floors and you will come across a barrage of jargon,  Moroccan, Italian, marble, heritage, Athanguddi, Azulejos, stone, ceramic, sandstone, composite, Jaipur, chevron, mosaic, terrazzo, painted, inverlochy. There is just too much to choose from.

Having lost much sleep over a wide range of choices,  I finally know what I am going to do with the rotten parquet.. It is impossible to list my entire reference file here, but will share ideas and inspirations I have picked up along the way in today's post.  I don't have particularly  pretty pictures of floors  tiles and the like, for those you need to head to pinterest, which is rife with stunning effects! These are mostly humble records I made with my iPhone for my reference, while scouring the markets and else where.

Hopefully  with the final finished product which will make a future post and this one, it will be possible to piece together a picture of how exactly the ideas translated to actual floors.

A final word about the inspiration :  The choices I made rest on three different factors, first- the relatively tiny budget, second- somehow ideas registered from travels or surfing the net etc muscled their way in (not just on the floors but rampantly and randomly in other corners too ! More about that later though ) Finally, from in and around Mumbai- my forever Muse!! 


Starting with the city it self. I  am taken by old Mumbai  Heritage floors....

Encaustic tiles in an old Mumbai building

Visit any old Mumbai building and you  are sure to notice the  'Mintons'. Richly patterned, startlingly  coloured and beautifully weathered encaustic cement tiles imported to the erst while Bombay Presidency by Liverpool based Minton's Ltd.
In production since the 12th century when  Cisterician Monks in England  hand made  them to pave  floors of European churches and monasteries- the art vanished a few 100 years down the road.  During the 1830s  several British firms  attempted to revive  the medieval art, one of the most successful  being Herbert Minton.

Most old buildings in Fort and neighbouring areas in Mumbai boast these striking tiles from bygone times..  

These are cement tiles in which the pattern or figure on the surface is not a product of the glaze but of different colors of clay. A tile may be composed of as many as six colours. The pattern is inlaid into the body of the tile, so that the design remains as the tile is worn down. These may be gazed or unglazed and the inlay may be shallow  as an eight of an inch, or as deep as  a quarter inch.

Recently restored tiles on stairs, gallery and corner,  Mumbai.

In  the initial years of  the British colonial period, the  tiles would be imported from England. Until they started to be manufactured locally in the early 1920s. They remained in manufacture until the 1940s. In the recent years,  a few tile makers based in Mumbai and elsewhere have  revived the old style of floorings.

Minton tiles on the landing of the grand staircase of a Museum in Mumbai.

Layers of vinyl peel exposing the  striking original Minton  floor in a crumbling building in Kala Ghoda, Mumbai.

Then there are good ol'  Ceramic tiles ...

Reference  image taken at a tile shop in Fort, Mumbai

Brightly colored, readily available and easy to lay. Add to it, the wide range of tiles and makes to choose from to suit all manner of tastes and decor.

 I chanced upon a stash of these old furniture tiles from Gujarat at a local flea market the other day.. (picture below). I have no idea about their vintage, make and  style etc.. From the look of it, they look like Portuguese inspired, the kind I have spotted in many a old Mumbai buildings. Do enlighten me if you have any idea about these.  

Hand glazed furniture tiles, from a flea market, Mumbai

                     

I am not quite sure about where these will go in the house at this stage.

Finally  getting back to my childhood home, I would like to do a spin on the traditional chequered black  and white with a Chevron pattern floor somewhere in the house..

 Wide V's of the Chevron  on the floor of a Colaba restaurant, Mumbai

Vibrant, contrasting patterns from a heritage hotel in Rajasthan.

Old chequered floor  in an old Mumbai building.