If you’re on Marine Drive in Mumbai, you most definitely have seen Pizza by the Bay, the Italian restaurant on the bottom ground of Soona Mahal, one of the vital placing Art Deco buildings on the bustling seaface. The streamlined constructing, inbuilt 1937, options cantilevered balconies, vertical accents topped with stepped ziggurat motifs, and a rooftop turret.
The Queen’s Necklace on Marine Drive homes stunning examples of this architectural style that took root a century in the past, marked by geometric patterns, porthole home windows, nautical motifs and the enduring Deco signage. In reality, Mumbai has the second largest assortment of Art Deco edifices internationally, second solely to Miami Beach.
Western India House, Fort
| Photo Credit:
Art Deco Mumbai Trust
The centenary of the motion in 2025 requires celebration — and quiet reflection. One hundred years in the past, on the banks of the Seine in France, the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes, a landmark exhibition that ran for seven months in 1925, marked the delivery of Art Deco, a design language that departed from the ostentation of Art Nouveau, the excesses of Victorian, and classical structure. Emerging alongside the useful minimalism of German Bauhaus and the modernity of supplies like glass, concrete, and metal, Art Deco embraced a daring aesthetic, that includes motifs equivalent to frozen fountains, ziggurats (rectangular stepped tower), sunbursts, pace strains, and components from Egyptian and Aztec cultures.
In the years bookended by the 2 World Wars, migration and journey introduced it to India. Affluent Indians, launched to the aesthetic in Europe, requested architects again residence to include Deco components into their new building. Mumbai, Chennai, New Delhi, and Kolkata noticed its strongest architectural expressions, whereas cities equivalent to Pune, Hyderabad, and the Chettinad area developed extra native interpretations.
Bank of Maharashtra
| Photo Credit:
Art Deco Mumbai Trust
Today, not all of it has survived, and there may be an pressing want for documentation and conservation. But, on the brighter facet, modern actions in textile, typography and design have been incorporating Art Deco motifs into their visible vocabulary. But extra on that later.
Documenting Deco, one metropolis at a time
Atul Kumar, founder-trustee of the Art Deco Mumbai Trust, and his crew have documented Mumbai’s Art Deco heritage, figuring out 1,324 buildings since 2017. From residential multi-storeys with geometric ventilators and chevron patterns to authorities edifices and cinemas, the Trust’s interactive map exhibits these the place they’re situated.
In its sister metropolis, Pune, the buildings have a robust vernacular affect. “We see the incorporation of mythology, lotus motifs and the Devanagari script,” says Kumar. Sugandhi Building, a household owned three-storeyed residential construction in Budhwar Peth, is a favorite for its evocative lotus imagery, vibrant palette, and trademark Deco options equivalent to round portholes and a mandap-like deck — its moniker derived from a household that specialised in perfumery and fragrances, dwelling in Pune for over 200 years.
Lotus imagery at Sugandhi Building
| Photo Credit:
Abhishek Gijare | Art Deco Mumbai Trust
Hari Krupa or Mehendale Building, a two-storeyed mixed-use constructing with retailers on the bottom degree, in Sadashiv Peth, is a primary instance of how native craftsmen wove Art Deco influences into the native cloth, with non secular iconography equivalent to swastiks and omkars, sunbursts and chevrons. “There is a unique melding of western and Indian styles — the designs are more intricate, and not as stylised as the Art Deco form,” he shares.
Hari Krupa, the household home of the Mehendales
| Photo Credit:
Abhishek Gijare | Art Deco Mumbai Trust
As many of the 90 residential buildings in Pune now home households and industrial enterprises, documentation has been robust. “We are focusing on outreach and sensitisation. Urban pressures [such as rapid plot development] are similar across cities, and there is no incentive to preserve or restore these homes. But the families we visited are keen to learn more about their heritage,” provides Kumar.
This sentiment is echoed by Adhiraj Bose, who has been documenting Kolkata’s Art Deco heritage since 2017. The metropolis has one in every of India’s earliest high-rise Deco buildings — the Tower House, inbuilt 1928 — and a residential residence, Jahaj Bari on Elgin Street, formed like a ship, reflecting town’s love for maritime imagery.
Hindu Mutual Building on Central Avenue
| Photo Credit:
Adhiraj Bose
Bose leads heritage walks, photographing tons of of residences in Lake Town and numerous authorities buildings. “Demolition and redevelopment are more popular and economically viable than restoration. The Red Bari café opposite the Kalighat temple, Roastery Coffee House in Gariahat, with its deep ochre and white walls, and the Broadway Hotel are examples of ‘repurpose and restore’ initiatives,” explains Bose, who’s presently striving to protect the vestiges of single household Deco properties in his neighbourhood, Lake Town.
Just a style assertion
“I’ve never looked at Art Deco seriously,” says New Delhi-based architect Gautam Bhatia. “I feel it is not an architectural style; it is more a decorative and ornamental one. It was a temporary, transitory phase going from the classicism of the late 19th and early 20th century into modernism. In India, what you see is a sort of exaggerated opulence in buildings — fancy lighting, stylised lettering, metallic ornamentation, all of which is two dimensional. It doesn’t have the appeal of any kind of three dimensional spatial quality. It is what people would construe as a kind of fashion statement in architecture. You didn’t need to worry too much about what is inside. In fact, in a lot of places, the spatial quality was completely neglected. Which is why Art Deco was perfect for cinemas. It drew people in from the outside into complete darkness. The only thing that is attractive about Art Deco is that it made people look at architecture. It is like a painting on a street. You can’t ignore it. It made people look up and stare — whether it was Regal Cinema or some apartment block in South Bombay.”
As informed to Surya Praphulla Kumar
Gautam Bhatia
| Photo Credit:
Special association
Inclusion of native sensibilities
Meanwhile, within the capital, the place largely Mughal and British Colonial types dominate, Art Deco nonetheless manages to shine. Architect Geetanjali Sayal, founding father of Deco in Delhi, a story web site and Instagram web page, started documenting the style round 2020 with researcher Prashansa Sachdeva. With 22 “pure deco” buildings, and a mixture of 4 hybrid and 13 influenced buildings, “we took a cartographical approach, starting with hand-drawn maps of Chandni Chowk and Daryaganj, archiving individual houses and small neighbourhoods”, says Sayal. “The focus wasn’t just on ornamentation, but design features like fireplaces, staircase structures, and flooring.”
22 Pusa Road, Karol Bagh (Nineteen Forties)
| Photo Credit:
Lumilanous
Smaller cities noticed the rise of Indo-Deco, a mix of recent building and native sensibilities. Heritage structure fanatic Smita Babar highlights Chettinad’s façades with its egg-lime plaster and stencil drawings, tucked away within the bylanes of Karaikudi, Tamil Nadu. The mansions replicate a want to straddle two worlds at the flip of the twentieth century, when prosperous Chettiar bankers constructed properties with conventional courtyards framed by imported glass, marble, and teak, adopting Art Deco components for his or her façades.
“Bas-relief figures of goddess Lakshmi sit alongside running bands, concrete and metal grills, and chevrons, highlighting how Art Deco was adapted,” she explains. Abandoned by households who migrated to cities, many properties (estimated to be between 10,000 and 15,000, in accordance with UNESCO) are maintained by caretakers or brokers. “Any restoration or conservation will require a material-based approach, picking singular elements for restoration.”
‘Bas-relief figures of goddess Lakshmi sit alongside running bands’
| Photo Credit:
Smita Babar
Art Deco detailing on a Chettinad mansion
| Photo Credit:
Smita Babar
And one of many individuals stepping as much as assistance is New Delhi-based architect Aishwarya Tipnis, who has developed a fabric toolkit — a free, research-based, on-line useful resource — to help practitioners with the restoration course of in addition to instructions on the place to seek out the supplies and abilities. “A homeowner on Pusa Road in Delhi wanted to preserve their home and used it for terrazzo [material made with marble chips embedded in a cement or epoxy] conservation,” says Sayal, whereas Tipnis, whose purpose is to help knowledgeable renovation and restoration, provides, “We have to train professionals to embrace change in ways that are aesthetically, economically, and environmentally appropriate for the future.”
Aishwarya Tipnis
| Photo Credit:
Special association
“It is good to see a new appreciation of spaces such as Manik Bagh as early expressions of distinctly Indian modernism, going beyond the overly simplified view that they were simply copies of what was trendy in the West. The collective vision of Maharaja Yeshwantrao Holkar II of Indore and architect Ekhart Muthesius of Berlin, Manik Bagh brought modernist design principles into an Indian context and began to shape the early thinking around Indian Modernism and Deco.”Yeshwant Rao HolkarHotelier and heritage conservationist
Yeshwant Rao Holkar
| Photo Credit:
Special association
Manik Bagh palace
| Photo Credit:
Special association
Letterforms meet legacy
Art Deco has formed not simply Mumbai’s shimmering skyline; its visible grammar has additionally permeated town’s typography. Tanya George, a Mumbai-based customized sort designer, has been fascinated by its fonts. “I started noticing letterforms on buildings — printed, flex, and with adaptations of Indian scripts. Art Deco’s design captured the spirit of looking forward, so even their letterforms have longevity,” she explains.
George created Dekko through the pandemic (2020-21), a Deco-inspired typeface that includes tall figures, slim fonts, and exaggerated waistlines, as seen in Devanagari and Latin scripts. “The project started with studying the letter forms, and the lockdown gave me more time to flesh out the design. Versions of the fonts have been used for identity across projects,” she says.
Dekko prints
| Photo Credit:
Tanya George
Sketches helped with the genesis of the English font, and the Devanagiri script adopted swimsuit. In her challenge with the Art Deco Mumbai Trust, she recreated the signal for Empress Court, an Art Deco constructing constructed in 1936, utilizing archival pictures and fashionable supplies equivalent to stainless-steel and polyurethane.
Empress Court
| Photo Credit:
Aashim Tyagi
Behind the glint
In May 2024, a classic suite of Art Deco Platinum Jewellery was the spotlight of on-line public sale home AstaGuru’s ‘Jewellery, Silver and Timepieces’. Comprising a necklace, bracelet, ear clips, and a hoop, the set offered for ₹1,86,91,200. “Globally, vintage and period-specific pieces are increasingly seen as style statements,” says Mumbai-based jewelry knowledgeable Jay Sagar. “Contemporary designers are drawing heavily from classic Art Deco motifs to create modern pieces that pay homage to the originals.”
A diamond and emerald Art Deco necklace
| Photo Credit:
Special association
For occasion, jewelry designer Hanut Singh, whose items have been showcased by celebrities throughout the globe, provides a contemporary tackle Art Deco, experimenting with rock quartz in jewels, or the crescent moon form paired with the linearity in pavè diamonds, providing a glimpse into the glamour of the period.
Hanut Singh’s Art Deco impressed jewelry
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy Hanut Singh
Art Deco has additionally impressed restaurant interiors. “The Bombay Canteen features vintage-inspired furnishing, terrazzo flooring, and intricate detailing,” says Sameer Seth, founder and CEO of Hunger Inc. Hospitality, including that their Art Deco Cocktail Book options cocktails named after landmarks equivalent to Liberty Cinema, Soona Mahal, and Sea Green Hotel. At the Bombay Sweet Shop’s Byculla retailer, the interiors characteristic curved glass shows and hand-blown glass lights, harking back to Mumbai’s iconic cinemas. And the signages of each “have typefaces that are bold, streamlined, and with geometric forms”, says Seth.
The Bombay Canteen
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy Hunger Inc.
Bombay Sweet Shop’s Art Deco impressed font
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy Hunger Inc.
The Bombay Canteen’s Art Deco Cocktail Book
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy Hunger Inc.
According to designer and restorer Kunal Shah, Art Deco’s timeless high quality endears it to at the moment’s designers. “There’s interest in objects like home décor, jewellery, rugs, saris, sunglasses, and shoes,” says Shah, who in 2022, curated a paean to Mumbai’s Deco motion with architectural pictures, artwork, collectibles, style, furnishings, and typography at Gallery 47-A in Khotachiwadi. Juxtaposing Deco’s standout options in opposition to the present metropolis design aesthetic, he says, “Art Deco sits uncomfortably with current aesthetic choices since today’s interior design style is aspirational, while [the former] was restrained and self-assured.”
Art Deco mirror particulars
| Photo Credit:
Kunal Shah
Porbandar’s gem
In the final wave of palace constructing, and within the early half of the twentieth century, a number of vital Art Deco royal palaces have been constructed — most famously Umaid Bhawan in Jodhpur, Manik Bagh in Indore, New Palace in Morvi, and Huzoor Palace in Porbandar. “Not many know about the last one. With its many wings and endless views of Porbandar’s French Riviera-like azure ocean, the Huzoor Palace is an architectural wonder,” says Deepthi Sasidharan, founder-director of Eka Archiving Services. “From its curving balconies and walls, ceramic and marble tiled geometric patterned walls and floors, to the pastel hued interiors and custom made thematic lights, fittings and carpets, it is an Art Deco masterclass.”
As informed to Surya Praphulla Kumar
Huzoor Palace in Porbandar
| Photo Credit:
Deepthi Sasidharan
Woven into borders and pallas
Elements of Art Deco are, nevertheless, discovering a brand new expression in Indian textiles and jewelry. In its Azalea assortment (2024-25), Jaipur Rugs has reimagined iconic motifs with a daring black-and-gold palette in hand-knotted rugs. “The bold geometry, symmetry, and glamour have a quiet dialogue with India’s textile traditions,” says Rutvi Chaudhary, the model’s director. “By reimagining these motifs, we celebrate this cross-cultural legacy and present it in a contemporary manner.”
Jaipur Rugs’ Art Deco design
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy Jaipur Rugs
Raw Mango’s Art Deco sari assortment creates shapes and kinds attribute of the motion, with streamlined woven ornamentation that’s geometric and stylised, translating them into silk and brocade. Think arched scalloped pallas with gold zari and hand-embroidered borders of architectural motifs. “The collection began as a questioning of possibilities,” says Sanjay Garg, founder and textile designer, including, “The challenge of any motif incorporation is to accurately capture the essence of textiles.” The analysis course of spanned a minimal of two years or extra by way of design and sampling at the studio, whose flagship retailer in Chennai, Malligai, is housed in a shocking Art Deco two-storey home constructed within the Sixties on Cenotaph Road.
Raw Mango’s Art Deco sari assortment
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy Raw Mango
A century in the past, India embraced a contemporary design language, imbuing it with its personal cultural tapestry, creating Indo-Deco. Today, Indian practitioners of the style stay optimistic that this timeless design syntax will endure in type and performance, supported by better consciousness, knowledgeable restoration, and detailed documentation.
“In the classroom, Art Deco is still not discussed in the same breath as other architectural styles because of the vast array of architectural wealth across the country. Our effort to document, study and preserve it, is to give the movement its due recognition,” Sayal concludes.
The freelance author is predicated in Chennai.
