Wood Works
Christophe Plais, 40 Creative Director, Terra Indica
Trained in carpentry and wood carving, and a degree in Political Science from Sciences Po, Bordeaux, young Christophe Plais had two options when it came to serving the country. “I could either volunteer for social work or for the army. I chose the former,” he says. Plais started working with Don Bosco’s Ashalayam, an NGO that provides Kolkata street children access to vocational and education training. Volunteering here gave him a taste of the city that made him coming back for more. “I cannot imagine working in any other city in India,” he says.
After a few years in France working for design companies, Plais decided to move to Kolkata in 2005 and started Terra Indica, a firm that trains the underprivileged children in various skills including carpentry, curving, painting and polishing, machine operating and even office management skills. Plais was steadily building a reputation for himself for restoring old furniture and slowly local offers of a similar nature started coming to him. But the big shift towards the local market happened quite by chance.
The French consulate in Kolkata was restoring an old building in Alipore and Plais applied for the tender. Restoring the wood work there caused word to spread. Now Terra Indica has its stamp on quaint little boutique shops and restaurants distinguished by their design. Restaurants like Fire and Ice, Mrs Magpie and 8th day Cafe and Bakery, as well as boutiques such as Tiapakhi and Dev r Nil and Coral, all bear its trademark woodwork or artwork.
Most of Terra Indica’s focus is on wood, though they do use materials like “brass, stainless steel, leather, gold leaf, petrified wood and mother of pearl to manufacture customised furniture”. Not just furniture, the firm has an interesting inventory of novelty art items like artist Pinky Kenworthy’s fibre glass sculpture of Goddess Kali’s head or Aditi Saraogi’s interesting ceramic pieces. Terra Indica also stocks a few pieces by Shantiniketan based Spanish artist, Pepe Zalba. At Terra Indica, 21, Gorachand Rd, Beniapukur Tel 22896728