A few weeks back, I discovered the joy of using a tool I did not even know the name of. I spent an engrossing afternoon, etching a wooden tile with a Buddha head, burnishing it and feeling rewarded. Being an artist sometimes limits you to one way of looking at the world and interpreting it. But then suddenly a new skill can punch open doors within and without. The experience reminded me of the massively successful American sitcom called Home Improvement where Tim Allen played around with the idea of Do It Yourself (DIY) projects. DIY has been a hugely lucrative industry in the West with home owners taking pride in tackling carpentry projects, house painting, lawn mowing and hobby ideas that can be as predictable as scrap booking and as challenging and fulfilling as mosaic making. The idea of a nail gun and a glue gun in the home tool kit has however not quite caught on in India.
Architecture for most part is a professional domain the world over but maintaining a home, refurbishing it, refreshing old furniture or making personalised pieces is either intrinsic to a culture or not. In India DIY is not a huge market and has not grown much beyond hobby ideas like pottery, ceramics, terracotta jewellery making and a few other homely diversions. Not many would think of gifting someone a power tool for Christmas or new year but recently Bosch, the company known not just for designing home and kitchen appliances for over 125 years but also creating power tools for home and professional needs, did something unusual. They opened their first DIY store in India, in Bangalore to be precise.
For the longest time, many Indian home owners have considered carpentry to be a specialised job they need to hire a professional for. Even hanging a picture can be a challenge for many families. The idea of etching a wood or glass tile with a shuddering, power tool, using a flame torch to give a burnished effect to wooden pieces, cutting tiles to create mosaic patterns on pottery or walls, using a glue gun to join anything to anything have been alien concepts.
The little Bosch DIY store on Bangalore’s Bannerghatta Road, is a stimulating place because it inspires consumers to be co-creators of their home environment. It encourages a hands-on approach towards design and draws people towards projects they can handle without intimidating them with big, complex tools. Recently the DIY Square invited a target group that included me to come and try their hands on a few design projects, to touch tools they have never been familiar with and experience the joy of taming them and creating something for the home. A few people tried their hand upon power cutting slabs of wood to create a side table in a jiffy. As dust flew and tools purred, faces grew more and more animated and people realised how empowering it can be to add a tool kit to their skill set.
The tools people tried their hand on could serve home needs, tackle hobbies and take care of the garden The DIY Square also hopes to start workshops to encourage more people to create and design home projects. The company has come a long way from the time when Robert Bosch (1861-1942) set up a company in Stuttgart and called it a “Workshop for Precision Mechanics and Electrical Engineering.” The Do-It-Yourself enthusiast may not be an authority on precision mechanics but a little bit of guidance at the DIY Square and some practice can make the difference between a joyful new hobby and dependence on handymen to fix back loose and worn out screws, fixing knobs, windows, cupboards, handles, creating furniture, drilling into wood, concrete or metal, putting up artefacts and paintings.
The world power tools industry is valued at over $9 billion and it is easy to see that the demand for DIY tools in countries like India, will boost these figures. But why will conservative consumers go for these tools? For one, they are light and easy to use even when they are used for tough applications like cutting, sawing and polishing wood. Once the technical aspect of a tool gets sorted, the home becomes a design studio where life feels complete because we did our bit to fix, polish and beautify it.
Reema Moudgil has been writing for magazines and newspapers on art, cinema, issues, architecture and more since 1994, is a mother, an RJ , an artist. She runs Unboxed Writers from a rickety computer , edited Chicken Soup for The Indian Woman’s soul, authored Perfect Eight and earns a lot of joy through her various roles and hopes that some day working for passion will pay in more ways than just one. And that one day she will finally be able to build a dream house, travel around the world and look back and say, “It was all worth it.”
Wow Reema! Good going! I know you have in it you to try your at at whatever you want and that also very successfully! You are a gifted soul! Stay as you are! You are an inspiration for everyone – children like your son; youngsters; and even grown-ups like me! The article is a wonderful reading. i wish I could also have such an experience!