In That Corner

That empty space next to the Tv unit is an eyesore, a blank. It needs a dash of colour. Or that corner table in the crook of the perpendicular between two sofas. Or the barren looking console. We all have empty spaces in our home, which we want to fill, not with clutter, but with something to accentuate the surroundings. Even in a minimalist home, you will often find the corners are adorned with something, a big lamp, or an arrangement of dry flowers, just a simple set of vases or a recliner.

Corners are technically the useless spaces in the house, when one comes to think of utility. These spaces, however, when artfully decorated can add the glamour quotient or a simply, some character to the space. I have always been a very big fan of a colourful daree spread, with floor cushions thrown in and a small coffee table with little knick knacks in a corner. A hookah maybe. Reminds me of Morocco. Not only does it look very inviting, it can also be very versatile in terms of the kind of rug you use, the cushion covers and what you keep on the small coffee table. Make it look ethnic, indo western or completely minimalistic, the choice is yours.

Coming to the question of what to adorn those corners with? The often neglected space, where the maid makes a quick run with the broom and that’s that? No. Go crazy with some eartherware stuff so readily available in the market these days. They come in terra cotta finish, which you can make over in your own style. Bring out the artist in you, paint, personalize and decorate your home!

WHAT YOU NEED:

1.     1.Any  earthenware object you find appealing while looking at the wide array on display at the potter’s.

2.      2.Primer (which acts as a base coat for the oil paint. If you don’t use primer, the clay soaks in the paint and the final layer of paint ends up looking dull in a couple of days.)

3.      3.Oil paint (in my case, I used bright red and black. The choice of colour is completely up to your personal taste and the way you want your object to look ultimately)

4.      4.Gold bronze powder (this can be used to add a bit of drama or glow to an otherwise solid looking object.)

5.      5.Linseed oil (to mix the bronze powder with)

6.      6.Rag cloth, paint brushes and plenty of newspaper to spread on the floor)

7.      7. Turpentine (to wash off the brushes and paint off your hands)

Getting started:

The first step to any art activity concerned with permanent paints (oil based) is to spread newspaper on the floor space that you will occupy for the activity. After all, you don’t want a nice piece of marble flooring in YOUR house to look stained an ugly. Then clean out the clay statues with a clean rag cloth to get rid of any surplus dust or stray mud particles. Shake the primer well and paint the statue with a thin layer.  Make sure to fill in any nook or cranny which is not directly visible too.

Allow it to dry properly. Normally takes about an hour to dry, but allow it to rest for 2 hours to be on the safer side. Then apply a coat of the colour you want your finished statue to be. I’ve used bright red oil paint on all part except for the jewelry, the musical instruments and the turbans which I wanted to highlight with gold bronze paint. Again ensure that all visible and not directly visible areas are properly painted.

                                            

                                         The nooks and crannies that should be taken care of.

After the first layer dries, apply the second coat and let it dry. In the meanwhile, take an old palette or a left over diya used last diwali and mix some gold bronze powder with linseed oil. 

Make sure it’s not too runny or the white of the primer will show through. Apply a layer of this mixture to the areas you wish highlight. Let all the paint dry over night.

The next day, look for any patches or unfinished areas and touchup the paint wherever needed. 

Then apply black paint for just the mustache to add a defined feature to an otherwise neutral face .

VOILA! You have something hand painted by none other than you to decorate your home! Keep these on a coffee table with some throw cushions to go and you have a mini hookah parlour ambience right in the beautiful space of your home!

The red men would look beautiful against a dark toned dari or a yellow wall, or both. Or visualize a white room, with just these little beauties as the center of attraction. Who says corners are boring!

An Open Letter to BIG BAAS, fi fi fi fi fi five. (To the Interior Designers)

This is my first entry for my new blog and in the spirit of Bitchwanti-ness AND from the perspective of someone whose field of expertise is interior designing; I shall talk about the BB5 house.

What I think is wrong with the house:

Take 1. You are put on a platform that slides into a hole(that’s what it looked like on TV) and next scene shows a massive wooden door sliding aside to let you in THE House. So what have we got here? An artificial lawn with Honey comb stepping stones. Very original! You expect to be let into a place that has a cottage, warm, natural look to it. At least I would, considering the entrance was about an element from our natural environs. The honeycomb.

Clearly, you are in for a nasty shock when you walk in and the place looks like kids went berserk with their painting kits. 

Let’s start with the flooring. It’s fairly normal. Standard beige tiles, what appear to be vitrified tiles. Your eyes travel upwards and you are shocked out of your mind when you see the yellow sofas, with boulder like black cushions. The next eye catching feature is everything. There’s a mad dash of bright pink in what is supposed to be the kitchen (sink-less to make the lives of the inmates utterly miserable). This brilliant piece of designing genius (which looks like it was designed for dwarfs, height wise) has an umbrella like structure hanging down from the ceiling, again pink. No surprise there. We are in barbie’s kitchen. Voila.

The Dining, is hideous to put in simple words. Pink in such quantities on the table is bound to cause loss of appetite, which is not what a dining table is meant for.

(NO IMAGE COULD BE FOUND FOR THE LADIES AND GENTS ROOM)

Moving on, the “ladies” bedroom is very predictably (and ghastly) pink. Why, I ask. Yes, women are said to have a general affinity towards the colour, but only till about the age of 5 would a girl want a PINK room. Correct me if I’m wrong here, but all the women in this house are well into their 20-30-40s. A dash of pink would have been acceptable and probably welcome. Unless of course you’re Pooja Bedi and coo, “this is so beautiful!” just because you have been paid a lot of money to appreciate such hideousness. The one feature I did like in this room though was the claw like structure on the backrest of each bed, keeping in mind the cat fights we are sure to witness with 14 women living under the same roof.

Then there’s the “boys” bedroom, which again is obviously done up in Blues and Greens. I am a girl and I love these colours. I want to ask the designers the reason for this partiality. That being besides the point, there is only one man in the house, that is Shakti Kapoor (who seems to think that purple nightdresses are meant for men). The space here is not well planned. There seems to be barely enough space to move around the room.

The “confession”room. My favourite part of the house. No offence to the women, I am one as well, but I believe that it looks like they were trying to make it look like the genitals of a woman. The vagina. I don’t, for one understand the point of the PINK swirls and the shapeless emerald green chair. What were they aiming for? To scare the living daylights out of whoever walks in to confess their scenes? Aaah, I seem to have hit on the truth there.

Then there’s the special quarters for the “captain” of the house. Here there’s blue and grey and white and black and a bed that looks like a cobra. Surely not the most soothing of shapes to sleep on.

As you put yourself through this kaleidoscope of colours, trying to find ONE dominating colour that creates a flow in the design (and give up), and your gaze turns heavenwards. And what have we here? The ceiling, lit as though you’re not in a house, but under the microscope of a loony scientist. Which in this case the inmates are, under the eyes of 52 odd cameras and the people on the other side of the TV. But that does not mean you forget that the people living in the house for the next 90 days are human beings too and although they are being paid to go through with these discomforts, a little care could have been taken with making the place more comfortable.

I understand you want to make the lives of the inmates as uncomfortable as possible, but keeping the washroom outside, at a 500 meter distance from the house is clearly stretching it too far. Same goes for the washing sinks, which are ideally supposed to be placed in the kitchen. BBoss has been taking “bad design lessons” progressively with every season. The first season we had a fairly tastefully done interior. Season 4 saw a well designed space, with white playing the underlying theme with dashes of olive greens and yellows making an appearance. The space did not feel cagey.

 The gymnasium in the BB5 house is a joke. One would wonder why they bothered having one. Probably some left over space.

WHAT I THINK COULD HAVE BEEN DONE:

I listed out what is wrong with the design. Now as a designer, keeping in mind the same colour scheme and concept that the designers had in mind, I will make a few suggestions as to what could have been done to make the place a little classy and soothing.

For starters, all the colours could have been toned down, used in their pastel tones. IF not, then they could have been paired such that they are at least complementary, instead of creating a hotchpotch of colours.

The flooring could have been wooden, since it is the biggest expanse, it would have held all the colours together, and even such bright colours would not have looked bad if they had one factor that continued the flow.

The Ceiling could have been plain white, instead of the glass and black they have used so liberally. That again would have helped maintain the flow. Lighting could have been more ambient, more toned down.

The Dining area could have worked better if they had only reversed the colours.The table could have been white and the chairs pink.

The Ladies room could have been done up in hints of gold and fuchsia, instead of the black, white and pink. The room looks like it belongs to kids, which in effect is not the case here.

The gents room could have been a combination of grey and blue, or black and grey. Subtle.

The “confession” room, with the same patterns could have been tastefully done up in black and green, rather than the pink and green. No one colour has any importance in that space. Big mistake.

The designer seems to have looked at nature as the concept, the free flowing curves give that idea.

But when they incorporated it on paper, clearly they did not pay attention to the essence of what nature is. Nature is calm, it is soothing. Most importantly, there is harmony. Something missing completely from the BIG BOSS house.

In their defense, the designers of this space will say that this was the client’s requirement. The aim of big boss is to cause mental trauma to the inmates in every possible way, to get them to fight for the benefit of a few cheap thrills of the people watching the show, that’s what gets them the TRPs. But it is the designer’s duty to create a space that soothes and calms and gives comfort. The big boss house this season is a shame to the community of designers.

Moral of the story: The kind of colours you see in the space you occupy affect your behavior, your mood and your conduct with the people around you.