The Snail and the Caterpillar

I often turn to nature for inspiration. It is in my surroundings that I find sinuous patterns that are functionally efficient and responsive to their context. From the leaves on a tree to shells lying ashore, my designs freely draw from nature and are refined interpretations of such settings.

The Snail and the Caterpillar were designed as sitting benches for our garden-themed booth at the India Design ID 2018.

Instead of relying on external purchases, we made a conscious decision to design customized furniture pieces and manufacture them in-house. I felt this would perfectly communicate our design philosophy and language to our audience. We conceptualized a live garden, manifesting garden insects as sculpture-cum-furniture elements. These enabled visitors to take a moment to sit and view our work and interact with us.

The shape and form of the Snail and the Caterpillar are interpretations of the eruciform morphologies of these common garden insects. The parametrically-designed sculptures are composed of multiple wooden splices that are connected via rods placed inside.

The benches can be used both indoors and outdoors; their interactive design enables conversations.They are economically productive, utilizing slab splices of wood or stone instead of carving a solid block. This also makes the process of their transportation and on-site installation easier; the multiple splices can be assembled and disassembled on site.

The conceptual idea behind the Snail and the Caterpillar is currently being customized to create a large wrap-around bench for a special-order installation.