Serendipity by Design - an accidental career turned success story with Sunita Kohli

National award-winning architectural restorer & designer Padma Shri awardee Sunita Kohli, takes us through the journey of giving architectural national treasures a new lease of life. From literature to travel, Sunita dissects the diverse set of art forms which shaped her design philosophy, lauded today across the world. 

Tune in to get a feel of the creative process of breathing new life into some of the most celebrated edifices globally. 

Transcript

Go-Beyond Podcast – Sunita Kohli Transcript

Speakers:

Akshay Kapur

Sunita Kohli

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Akshay Kapur

Welcome to the Sony Pictures Networks Go Beyond Podcast where we go beyond the surface and uncover the extraordinary. I'm your host Akshay Kapur, today we have a guest who has excelled to many heights in a variety of passions. She was even the Padma Shri awardee in 1992 and being the first Indian designer to be invited to give an illustrated lecture at the prestigious national building museum in Washington DC in 2003. She's had an illustrious career over the years and today we're going to dive into many touchpoints about her journey. It's a pleasure to welcome Sunita Kohli, Sunita welcome to the Go-Beyond podcast. How are you doing today.?

Sunita Kohli 

Well thank you for that very kind and generous introduction.

Akshay Kapur

I think it's accurate. You know Sunita I think it's safe to say that when it comes to the theme of our podcast, Go beyond. You are someone who has managed to do so in the most diverse manner. You're a fan of poetry. You're a rock collector. You've authored books on food. You've spent time in academia. Educating future leaders and then professionally been involved in the restoration of monuments and historical buildings so I think it's safe to say you live a full life and that there's so much to cover and so much to talk about. So can you tell us about growing up in the cultural melting pot of Lucknow and how that catered to you developing and pursuing such diverse passions through the years

Sunita Kohli 

I think it began because I was born to the parents that I was because they were so interested in and curious about things beautiful.

And also ah because I grew up in a city like Lucknow although I was born in Lahore and both very culturally rich cities. So, my early years with my father particularly one was spent you know going to kabadi wala’s though of course now they fancily call themselves uh.. Antiquarians or antique dealers. So, I went to my first auction where I actually also bid for something at the age of 9 but that's another long story.

Akshay Kapur

Um, may I just ask you quickly what it was you were bidding on.

Sunita Kohli 

Ummm…A string of round Emerald, Emerald beads.

Akshay Kapur

Um, Wow. Wow.

Sunita Kohli

Yeah, I know, my father was aghast when actually the bid came through because he couldn't afford it. Ah.

Akshay Kapur

(Laughs) 

Sunita Kohli 

And then you know my father laid a great emphasis on traveling and on education and my parents were great readers so immersive reading became part of our lives we exchanged books and recommended books to each other and Lucknow was a very laidback life in one sense which gave one time to reflect and my father always said if somebody was looking for me and they were saying where's Sunita she said where could she be? She must be somewhere either dreaming or reading. 

Akshay Kapur:

Right? 

Sunita Kohli 

I studied music for many many years Hindustani classical music and I have a Visharad in it also so all that went alongside studying literature and traveling with my parents and that sort of laid back life I think is what in later years probably was making the foundations of my profession as an interior designer and now it's been fifty years. 

Akshay Kapur

(laughs) Well I think it's very common for us in our younger years to have such a diverse range of interests and passions and pursuits. I think the obvious question is how did you manage to maintain this even in your adult life?

Sunita Kohli 

Um I mean there's work and which I consider also pleasurable, but there are also interests which are pleasurable and everybody speaks about multitasking. I have to admit that I have never ever been a multitasker. Whatever I'm doing or whoever I'm with, I'm concentrated in that moment. I don't see other things beyond me whether that's fault or failing or whatever. But that's me! So, I think um, you know one of the reasons I've been able to work on many diverse design projects simultaneously and when I say diverse not only are because their cultural milieu is different. Um, the research that was required or is required is different is because I can mentally compartmentalize. So I guess that's the way everybody has their own formula and this is mine I think.

Akshay Kapur

Um, right. Lovely. We just talked about you know what led to you developing a love for design. Was it sort of serendipitous that it actually became a career for you or what was the journey like to actually making that a career that you wanted to pursue.

Sunita Kohli 

I think it was serendipity and also that you know yeah in my growing up years there was no such thing as interior design as a profession. It just did not exist. I'd never even heard the word whilst I was growing up. 

Akshay Kapur:

When was the first time you heard the word?

Sunita Kohli

I think the first thing I started doing was collecting nineteenth century furniture which you could find in Lucknow, because Lucknow is part of that great Paluptari belt which goes from Lucknow to Calcutta, and you know you find really very beautiful things which don't exist any longer. So um then from that I had a small antiquarian business when I first started and then I started reproducing those items of furniture and then when somebody said, why don't you decorate my room, was the first time it really registered that my furniture where it was going I was also going to be decorating those rooms. I had yet to become a designer.

So, I think that's when I first heard it and then I did my first hotel for the Oberois in 1975 in Khajurao, and I so sort of learned on the shop floor and of course in my profession you are only as good as your last project and that led to other projects and before I knew it, I was a hotel designer, and I was working internationally.

Akshay Kapur

That's lovely. I mean that all sort of culminated for you in 92 when you won the Padma Shri for interior design and restoration, and I think obviously that's an amazing accomplishment all around but it's even more so when you realize that you never actually had any formal training in interior design. So, you know with that in mind, did not having any formal training in interior design mean that you had to face any unplanned challenges when this passion became your profession?

Sunita Kohli 

Every project was a challenge but to be a designer is to have the same sort of talent I guess you would call it if I may sort of humbly say so, is like what musicians have which comes naturally to them. 

Akshay Kapur

Um I think it's a fair game. Right.

Sunita Kohli 

Yes, So I think that the ability to conceive within one's mind and see with one's mind's eye. You might see a greenfield project and your mind in two years’ time has already seen what that hotel will be like once it is completed that ability and the steps that go towards building up that concrete realization is what I think makes designers. I always say that I cannot be blasé about the fact that I was conferred the Padma Shri. It's a huge honor and particularly being the first was it also puts a responsibility of sorts. 

So that was very inwardly rewarding, you know. I never ever used my Padma Shri medal. You know you're supposed to use it for formal things I have it in a cupboard and like to open it and see it. It makes me feel quite happy. (laughs)

Akshay Kapur

(Laughs) Ah, I can totally imagine.

So they say the proof of the pie is in eating the evidence is when you visit K2 India’s website and you click on the awards section and over the years is just a scroll of different pictures of different awards. 

Sunita Kohli

Yes, yes, so I mean as you said serendipitously it happened for me. So, one is kind of grateful for that.

Akshay Kapur

But also, you've enjoyed a short stint in academia correct? Could you tell us a little bit about your life in academia and why education is such an important part of who you are?

Sunita Kohli:

Well, you know because my first job in life was actually teaching at Loretto College in Lucknow. And I taught world history whilst I was doing my own masters at Lucknow University and why was I teaching world history because I've done intermediate, before I went to Lady Shiri Ram college to do the honors in English and through some strange reason, I got the highest marks in world history that the college had ever got (laughs) so when I returned, principal mother Bernardine asked me to teach every day. And then of course then I started working on a PhD on Christopher Marlowe after my MA on which I never completed I only had three months to go. 

Then for a very short spell I became a copywriter that's something I didn't particularly enjoy because I'd come from a from a background of academia and then to be you know in a great firm… all right... but they were all very excited about a bread account which was 50 lakhs and they were all you know the jingle – “mummy mummy modern bread I said oh my God!”.

Akshay Kapur

(Laughs)

Sunita Kohli

Where’s world history and Marlow and where’s this? So I said, ah, you know there was an amazing lot of people who were there at that time I mean truly very creative, very amazing, but copywriting, I realized very quickly was not for me. And unfortunately, very shortly after that I started to, restore furniture got married and in seventy-one I began what I do to date which is interior design and manufacture furniture.

Akshay Kapur

That's lovely. I think one thing that clearly stands out Sunita is that through everything you've shared with us. You really go to great lengths and you always sort of seem to be excelling in various avenues whether it's interior design whether it's world history I must ask you, you are a rock collector. So Is it true that you go to great lengths to add rocks that you desire to your collection?

Sunita Kohli 

I don't go to great lengths, but I really love rocks and because when you think about it Akshay, every rock is some millions of years old whether it's historical or not that's a separate matter.

Akshay Kapur

Right. 

Sunita Kohli

And so you know if I had picked up one small rock from Ambetka or Angkor Wat or you know Petra or something to me it is mnemonic. I don't need to buy a souvenir, to me the whole trip comes back just by looking at that one rock.

Akshay Kapur

Wow

Sunita Kohli

So I just find them and you know I love because of how organic they are I love petrified wood. I collect fossils. I wish I had more of them. 

Akshay Kapur 

(Laughs)Ah, yeah I mean it's reminding me of something that you mentioned the one of the first times we spoke which is there's this story of an airplane when you umm if I recall correctly you were trying to bring an ammonite back from ah somewhere abroad. 

Sunita Kohli 

Oh my god. Well! you see I had seen this wonderful ammonite, which my cousin-in-law in New York had got from Morocco. And she said you know Sunita you love it so much I have two, I'll give you one now the one that she gave me the smaller one is only twenty-five kg.

Akshay Kapur

Wow! (laughs)

Sunita Kohli

So I couldn't put it in my suitcase because it wouldn't have gone through I said let me try and take it out. So, I put that in my sturdy you know trolley bag to carry on and I put it through the security check and the chap at JFK airport said what is this I said it is just a rock. He said I don't think you'll be allowed to take it in. I said look it's so heavy I can't do anything with it you know I've just put it. he was very nice I must say he said look lady I'll allow you to go through but how you get it on the plane is your own business. 

Sunita Kohli 

So what I did was I mean there are many advantages to wearing a saree. So beneath my knees my bag with the twenty-five kilo ammonite and I tucked it under that and I took out my two shawls and I put it across my knees and pretended I was very sick and closed my eyes. So that's the way I got it! (laughs)

Akshay Kapur

(laughs) Um, that's brilliant.

Sunita Kohli 

I know… well there are many ways one has had to do many things. (laughs) The most recent adventure of course I was traveling in Armenia and Georgia and this is the last major trip I made probably three years ago.

Sunita Kohli

Yeah, and you know there they have this volcanic glass. Everybody was busy buying the the jewelry that is made from this volcanic glass, but I only saw the big clumps of glass that were there, so whilst my friends were buying all this I just bought 11 pieces of those of course it's all quite heavy I wasn't worried about the weight or anything but how to take it back.

I would have to take it in my case and that time I was not allowed to carry it because, it's ah can be a dangerous weapon. So I said okay, then fortunately somebody said but you can put it in baggage that is going to be booked.

Akshay Kapur

Hm, checked in.

Sunita Kohli

So I did something. Now when I have it I see it every day in my living room in a bowl. I just love it and the adventure of having got it to Delhi. (laughs)

Akshay Kapur 

(laughs) I'm assuming it blends in with the rest of the design that you have in your living room. 

Sunita Kohli 

I don't. I'm not a great matching-matching designer. I think homes should be biographical to me.

Akshay Kapur

Right? right.

Sunita Kohli 

I mean because each object should tell its own story and it's at least for the people who reside there ah it should be meaningful.

Akshay Kapur

Ah, of course of course. But since we talked about your design philosophy. You've also been involved in over the years restoring some of the most breathtaking monuments in historical sites across the world, in India, in Egypt and China and in Bhutan as well. Can you tell me which has been the one project that you've enjoyed working on the most for whichever reason?

Sunita Kohli 

See umm if I could rephrase your questions slightly.

Akshay Kapur

(laughs) Please.

Sunita Kohli

And not say most the most enjoyable because I really have to say that, that every project has learned much from and really from every I say that with all sincerity and gratefulness because to me each project has been fantastic for myself.

Akshay Kapur

Right, right

Sunita Kohli

Each project has added to my learning curve. So, each project has been very rewarding and has made me very happy. But if one were to say what was the most challenging project that I have ever worked on would probably be the parliament building that I designed for the Bhutanese government in Thimphu. 

Akshay Kapur

Okay.

Sunita Kohli

Because at that time when I was. ah, chosen to design it, there were no books available on Bhutan. 

Akshay Kapur

Hmm.

Sunita Kohli 

But I was fortunate that at that time, ah, once I had been appointed then then they gave me every help, because you know these become great representative buildings and they must represent a country and the greatness of that culture.

Akshay Kapur

Right

Sunita Kohli 

There was another appointment that they gave me a great guide to travel with me to Tsung across the width of Bhutan. And this was somebody called Basho Khandu, who had encyclopedic knowledge about Bhutanese arts and crafts. So, one really had the great fortune of traveling with this amazing man and learning so much. So, you know these have become the great pleasurable experiences of working in other cultures and coming across these amazing people with their amazing minds. But I completed it and finished it and then in 2010 when SAARC was going to take place for the first time in Bhutan one was invited to add on things to this project I had done then, and this time of course it was with my daughter who's an architect, Kohilika. And so we both worked on it and got many accolades for it. 

Akshay Kapur

Ah, no, definitely and I'm glad you mentioned that ah you worked on this with your daughter because you talked about some of the amazing relationships and encounters you've had with people you've met and now you founded K2 India with your daughter Kohilika, and obviously speaking of relationships, parent-child relationships always have the potential for colorful dynamics on both ends of the spectrum.

Sunita Kohli 

True.

Akshay Kapur

So were there initially any unexpected challenges to working with your daughter and how did you come around them. 

Sunita Kohli 

Well, you know the first challenge was that when she returned from New York after having and got her architectural degree she didn't want to work with me. She just wanted to start on her own and I fully respected that. But in 5 years and she done a couple of really good projects by then and of course you know she began off by taking anything that came her way. And then we decided that let's pull in our companies under the umbrella of K2 India and why K2 because K2 is the great mountain more difficult to climb than Everest, and then right now it was Kohli and Kohli and eventually It would be Kohilika Kohli so I was doing future thinking.

But then firstly we have a very good relationship as mother and daughter. Having said that. Um, we don't work in the studio as mother and daughter. We work as 2 professionals who bring equal things to the table um, it's secondary that we happen to be related. 

Akshay Kapur

Right. 

Sunita Kohli 

One is also fortunate in that because you know I have never um I mean it's not that and whenever she refers to me as her boss I mean she's I don't know who is who's boss because you know she's the CEO of the company. 

Akshay Kapur

(Laughs) Right

Sunita Kohli

So, I have to abide by several decisions that she makes. (laughs)

Akshay Kapur

(laughs)You know, um, ah Sunita one of the things that has stood out in in all the the stories you've shared so far is there's this sense of um… symbolism and themes when you talk about your design philosophy when you talked about the project in Bhutan the having to represent the diversity of the Bhutanese culture and of course one can obviously see that as a student of literature that's where the roots of this philosophy perhaps lie but it's so poetic and I know that poetry is something that is not just close to your heart but also an integral part of your identity and you mentioned that you read 2 poems every day and admittedly each poem is filled with a number of unique messages for each reader but what has been the single biggest takeaway that poetry has had for you.

Sunita Kohli 

You know I I like to read and I enjoy poetry. Um…and yes I read 2 poems a day every single day and um, so that becomes also part of my mindscape they are they, They are all inhabitants of my mind. This is my pleasure. 

Akshay Kapur

Right. Have you ever taken a gander at writing some poetry yourself.

Sunita Kohli 

Don't we all?  in good, bad or indifferent that I did cover four notebooks of poems and those do in blank verse because there was a period when I was hospitalized for sort of three months and so I started keeping a journal and that has converted itself into a book of poems called ‘Not a Fall from Grace’ because I fell and I broke my neck. So therefore, the title. But it will only be for internal and family distribution.

Akshay Kapur

Fantastic! And as we come to the close of our conversation today Sunita, I wanted to return to this idea of going beyond in different spheres of life. Having been someone who's excelled in diverse fields do you have any takeaway for our listeners who may be looking to do the same?

Sunita Kohli 

Um, you know going beyond is a very relative term because and being diverse which you've kindly called me is also relative. It's the interest that one has when one is young in one's youth and I'm going to quote ah um, it's from a play by Eugene O’Neill where he says that ‘only in your youth can you prepare for your middle age’ and I've always said that sometimes I wish young people would realize not to waste time.

Akshay Kapur

Right.(laughs)

Sunita Kohli 

Because you know time is of the essence, for instance I'm in the autumn of my life but because I just turned 75 and umm I wish there were some things that I was studying now and I've had a life of study but I wish there were some subjects that have started to hugely interest me now.

I could have started working on them in my thirties.(laughs)

Akshay Kapur

(Laughs) Ah, absolutely and speaking of the subjects you thought maybe you wish you had studied in your younger days. Any specific subjects that you can think of right now?

Sunita Kohli 

I wish I had studied Indian philosophy the way it interests me now. I mean you know I have to tell you one of my most favorite books ah in the world is the Mahabharat and I have read many many versions of it and I read also many commentaries on it like Yugant by that brilliant Dr. Ira Karvade and um so I wish I had begun this study much much earlier.(laughs)

Akshay Kapur

Sunita I think that brings us to the close of our conversation today. But thank you so much for taking the time to join us on the Go Beyond podcast and I must say that some of the stories and the little pearls of wisdom that you've shared I think they have been definitely of great interest to me and I'm sure our listeners will find something that changes their perspective in their pursuit in life.

Sunita Kohli 

Thank you so much Akshay, you’ve been a wonderful interviewer, and this is my first podcast I didn't realize it could be done with so much ease. So, thank you for that it’s been wonderful, and you know I hope your listeners enjoy it as much as I have enjoyed speaking with you.

                                                                                          ~ends~