There is no quintessential Indian chair, but one can possibly say that there is, or was, a quintessential way of sitting in India, says Sarita Sundar, founder of Bangalore-based heritage interpretation and design consultancy 
Sundar’s book tells an engaging, lavishly illustrated story that spans centuries and examines the deeper meanings embedded in the seat. “They cater to our needs simultaneously defining as they limit, assigning behaviours — of authority, submission, power, surrender, privilege, resignation, decorum, propriety, docility, endurance, comfort, and often, discomfort,” writes Sundar.
In this interview with Moneycontrol, Sundar talks about, among others, some of the iconic seats/chairs that were birthed in India, the institutions and companies that introduced modernism into the country, and the influence of popular culture on chairs.
India has always been a floor-sitting culture. When did the chair come into the picture?
We were late in adopting the chair, as we know it. We adopted it during the colonial period when the first chairs came in with the Portuguese, Dutch and the British. But we always had elevated seats and we have documentary evidence of these being used as far back as the 3rd century CE.
What is interesting is that the four-legged version of the seat is actually defined in some Indian languages. For instance, in Telugu, it is called naalkaalige, the four legged one; the Malayalam word for chair, kassera, comes from the Portuguese cadeira. In the north, kursi comes from the Arabic word for throne, which clearly indicates that as an elevated seat, there is an element of hierarchy or at least privilege built into its meaning.
What role did the National Institute of Design (NID), the Chandigarh Project, and companies such as Godrej & Boyce play in the evolution of the chair in India in the last century?
Each of these institutions played a key role in heralding modernism into India and introduced the country to different forms of the seat. The Chandigarh Project was a fusion between the Western sort of formal International Modernist Style that Pierre Jeanneret (Le Corbusier’s cousin and fellow architect) came in with and the contributions of Indian architects and craftsmen.
Companies such as Godrej & Boyce introduced India to furniture made from steel. One of the ways they did this was by reimagining (Hungarian-born designer and architect) Marcel Breuer’s Cesca chair in the form of the CH4 in the 1930s. The CH4 broke away from the idea of a four-legged chair, and they were able to do that because of the strength of the metal. Chairs like the CH4, which were industrially produced, catered to the needs of a new, soon to be independent nation.
Furniture design as a formal discipline was first established at the NID. The curriculum at NID was influenced by movements such as Bauhaus and Ulm, but Scandinavia too played its part.
The late Gajanan Upadhyaya, considered to be the father of Indian furniture design, was trained in Denmark. On returning to India, he introduced a Scandinavian approach in certain areas and a general international modernist language to Indian furniture design.
Then again George Nakashima (Japanese-American furniture designer) also played a big role, bringing in a philosophical and almost spiritual aspect to relationships that creators have with materials, particularly wood.
Which are some of the iconic seats/chairs that came out of the meeting between the colonisers and the colonised?
Certainly, the Roorkhee Chair, which was named after an Indian Army regiment in the lower Himalayas. This unassuming campaign chair is considered to be a triumph of engineering and influenced, among others, Kaare Klint’s Safari Chair and Breuer’s Wassily Chair.
The Planter’s Chair, synonymous with the colonial lifestyle, was another. Then you had the six-legged Indo-Portuguese folding chair, which was an integral part of sea-faring and also found a place in homes.
You also had the colonial divan, which kind of married the raised baithak and colonial ‘four-leggedness’.
What kind of influence has popular culture had on chairs in India?
A big influence from popular and classical culture has been the wedding throne. Seats have played a role in wedding rituals for ages. These include the palakka from Kerala, the swing or ‘oonchal’ used in traditional Tamil weddings, and the patlo and sankheda chairs from Gujarat. But we never had this idea of paying ‘darshan’ to the bride and groom in traditional weddings, and the wedding throne is now pretty much a part of every banquet hall, and its arrival on the stage is a prompt for guests to queue up and ‘see and be seen’ with the newly wedded couple.
Will hybrid work culture change the way chairs are designed?
It’s already happening. You already have seats that allow for better — fluid, dynamic — postures by integrating space for your laptop or things like that into the frame.
Discover the latest Business News, Sensex, and Nifty updates. Obtain Personal Finance insights, tax queries, and expert opinions on Moneycontrol or download the Moneycontrol App to stay updated!
