‘STARTED HER OWN DESIGN COMPANY’

An Assamese married to a Bengali, Deepa made Hyderabad her home in 1991 when her husband Pradeep Sen came to the city for his work. Between 1991 and 1999, she spent time in the business of restoring furniture from the Old City, realising it was something she could leverage on later. And she did, though after she’d spent years in a structured job in the corporate setup. “Corporate life gave me tremendous exposure to the basics of setting up a business as I learnt how to be process-oriented and metrics-driven,” Deepa recollects.

From 1999 to 2016, Deepa worked in a corporate setup in the city, leading the learning and leadership department of a Fortune 500 company. When she quit the job at age 55, Deepa went back to her first love, interior décor, setting up her interior design company, ‘Studio Marigold’.

“I’ve always been passionate about design, rearranging my own home as well as friends and family, even as a teen, drawing on my imagination from what was available locally — ideas from interior design magazines, which I spent my pocket money on,” says Deepa. She admits her travels in India and abroad have inspired, educated and refined her skills. With sustainability as its credo, her studio mainly designs and customises contemporary homes and offices, while working on occasional renovation projects. Studio Marigold is currently working on extensive project of renovating an old home where the residents want to rework and reimagine their classical pieces. “My mum set the foundation for this. Everyone at home learnt to set up our own businesses; even my son, who was an HP employee, became a chef and has his own business,” Deepa says.

Maybe it’s the joy of working at what she loves because the years don’t show on her though she credits some of it with her corporate setup. “It was important to stay wellgroomed and fit and without greys, all of which has helped me in good stead in my second avatar as an interior decorator.”