PROFILE

Patankar flaunts his own creations

As a child growing up in Mumbai, Harshad Patankar was obsessed with designer watches. By the time he was 20 years old and studying engineering, he was already designing watches for himself and his friends. And today, at 28 years, this shy designer has carved out a unique niche for himself by making watches and clocks made from wood. He says: “When I was in college I used to design my own watches and never repeated a design twice. I used to wear a new wristwatch every month.”

The unique centre-table resting on a faux-rock support

Patankar works out of a small workshop in Kurla, a far-eastern suburb in Mumbai and makes at least two watches a day. When he started out a year ago, he designed and made the watches himself. Today, he has three workers to help him.

A clock made in acrylic and wood

He doesn’t retail from top design stores. Instead, he showcases his works at art galleries and exhibitions in Mumbai like the Nitaai Gauras Art Gallery, Artists’ Centre and the Kala Ghoda Art Festival. Art, he feels, is something that runs in his veins as his mother Jayashree Patankar is a well-known artist who specialises in the ‘Chitrakathi’ (a type of folk art originating in the 17th century in Maharashtra that uses natural colours extracted from flowers) style of painting.

As a student, Patankar enrolled for mechanical engineering because he “always wanted to know how things work”. But he decided quite early that he wasn’t cut out to be a mechanical engineer. So, after graduating, he listened to his creative side and took to designing watches as a full-fledged profession.

He was soon flooded with orders from friends and this encouraged him to launch his label Little Bent last year. Today, he has already sold more than 5,000 wristwatches and about 1,000 clocks and his clients include artists and Bollywood celebrities.

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Fibre, metal and wood come together in this edgy timepiece

He reckons that his pieces combine utilitarian value with an arty touch. Since he primarily works in wood, he usually chooses earthy finishes for his wristwatches — ranging from brown to bronze. He often gives his pieces “a weather-beaten look”.

A wall clock in the shape of an Audi steering wheel

Harshad uses various types of wood — including rosewood, teak, mahogany and ebony — to make wooden dial cases and adjustable straps. However, he points out that these watches are not for everyday wear. He says: “Wooden watches are not water resistant and therefore you cannot wear it on a regular basis.”

Every piece he designs has a unique design language. When he gets orders he first asks about the client’s preferences in terms of design. “I also keep in mind the profession they belong to and design accordingly,” he says. For instance, for a client who wanted to make a gift to an orthopaedic doctor he designed a small table-clock looking like a tree supporting its branches with a crutch.

PROducts

The two-feet sculpture made for Shah Rukh Khan’s birthday

It goes without saying that all his pieces are customised. The wristwatches — for both men and women — are handcrafted with careful attention given to minute mechanical parts so that dust from the wood doesn’t hamper the working of the watch. He also experiments with faux leather and copper to make trendy designs on straps. His wristwatches start at Rs 1,500 and go up to Rs 7,000. The watches come with a one-year guarantee.

His clocks are unique too, made mostly in wood. Patankar first comes up with a concept inspired from everyday mundane objects like kites, taps, buckets, scissors, clothes-hangers, umbrellas, raincoats, shoes and so on.

For instance, on Shah Rukh Khan’s birthday one of his clients wanted him to make something special that would catch the actor’s attention. So he made a two-feet sculptural show-piece in which he mounted a movie camera (sculpted in wood) on a tripod made of cricket bats (made of deodar wood). “I wanted to bring out the association of his fascination for cricket and films in this piece,” he says.

A quirky wood and metal creation

His other stunners include a wooden bucket on which copper wires are attached to show the hands of the clock. Then there is a bicycle wall-clock with the spokes of the wheel acting as numbers.

Patankar also experiments with furniture which he calls “utility-sculptures”. He says: “I always wanted sculptural pieces to have a utilitarian value.”

For instance, he has designed a six-feet tall teak wardrobe designed to look like an open book with Sanskrit slokas etched on it. Or take a look at a centre-table which rests on a supporting structure designed to look like a rock (it’s actually made from wire mesh, cement and sandstone). Several taps come out of the rock and he has used fibre glass to make it look as if water is coming out of the taps. The surface of the table is a thick glass top, which rests on the faux rock.

His dinner tables are also very unusual. For instance, there’s a piece which has a tall central column made in glass — inside the column he has put miniature chairs. A thick glass piece on the top completes the dinner table. His customised furniture pieces are priced between Rs 15,000 and Rs 40,000.