We couldn't make it to Birla scion Ananya Birla's launch of Curo Carte, her global e-commerce platform said to offer rare, handmade, high quality, high end, luxury products, but we were curious about what had led the young entrepreneur to veer in a direction so seemingly different from her earlier venture in micro finance to empower the disenfranchised
Ananya Birla
We couldn’t make it to Birla scion Ananya Birla’s launch of Curo Carte, her global e-commerce platform said to offer rare, handmade, high quality, high end, luxury products, but we were curious about what had led the young entrepreneur to veer in a direction so seemingly different from her earlier venture in micro finance to empower the disenfranchised.
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"I haven’t really changed directions; I like to think of it as broadening my horizons. I have always been passionate about travel and design and wanted to bring redefined luxury to people’s lives,” says the Oxford alumnus, known as a chess player of consequence.
Her latest venture, which she conceptualised while travelling, she believes is ‘new age design put together with handmade talent can create magic.' As for chess, does she play with her parents? And who is a better player between the two? "Whenever I get the time, I like to unwind at home with my family and friends. We usually play cards and board games," says the young lady, tactfully side stepping the question.
Par for the course
One of the collateral damages of vote bank politics is the need to appease the multitudes. The rich and powerful may sup with you at your home, but any politician worth his ambition knows that he has to get voted in again. What this has to do with the city’s jewel, its race course, which sits like an emerald at the very entrance of South Mumbai, itself an antique in a changing cityscape, is not hard to imagine.
Vivek Jain
The racecourse, one of the last remnants of the city's beauty, is said to be under siege. Now that he has won the election uncontested as we had first reported a week ago, we wanted to know how RWITC Chairman Vivek Jain was planning to protect it from alleged interests.
“With its enviable 226 acres in the heart of South Mumbai, the Mahalaxmi race course has been often been the target of builders and the Government,” said Jain. "We successfully staved off a bid by a well known builder to convert parts of the racecourse into a five star hotel, etc," he said adding, "More recently the MMRDA has requisitioned 3 acres of the property."
As for political agendas, Jain did not mince words. "We are aware of Shiv Sena’s intentions to make a garden theme park at the centre of the racecourse and of its desire to shift the racecourse to Navi Mumbai. I had the occasion to meet both Uddhav Thackeray and his son Aaditya some months ago and impressed upon him that such a move would kill the sport,” says Jain.
And what of the elitist tag that the sport of racing has earned, thus making it a soft target, we asked. "Every city needs recreation grounds and we are the only club in the city on leased land that is truly open to Mumbaikars, except during racing hours. We maintain a public park, have equestrian sports and the centre is used as an open playground for all sport. We plan to convince the Sena and the State that the century old racecourse must stay as it is, for the good of the city," he says. Indeed.
Absolutely fabulous
“The six colours of the pride flag have different meanings and these colours are present on the bottle,” says artist Sharmistha Ray, who was part of last evening’s introduction to Absolut Colors – the brand’s latest limited edition release dedicated to the LGBT community, which was inspired by artist Gilbert Baker, creator of the Pride Flag.
Sharmistha Ray
“The company was looking to decode the six colours of the gay pride flag through six selected artists,” she said. “Each artist was presented a chance to create an expression around the theme for the evening.” Ray, who had lived in New York, before moving back to India, was born in Kolkata, and grew up in Kuwait before the Gulf War rendered her family apart. She also has a light installation called “In Search of Rainbows” in her solo show at the end of the month. She was unavailable for comment on the quality of the vodka served at the time of going to press.
The wedding planner
The daughter of filmmaker Basu Bhattacharya and writer Rinki, and granddaughter of legendary filmmaker Bimal Roy, Chimoo Acharya, whose backdrop for the ongoing wedding special of an international fashion magazine in Dubai has won praise, grew up in Mumbai where she studied interior design at SNDT University.
Chimoo Acharya (in white) and her team
Marriage took her to Dubai where she decided to go back to her designing and started her company, Encore in 2001, event managing mammoth Bollywood concerts for a start (this included driving singer Shaan into the stadium in her Mercedes coupe once to make a grand entry).
Rohit Bal at the bridal extravaganza at Dubai
She went on to diversify into corporate events for multinational banks and weddings for Dubai’s rich and famous amongst the Indian and Pakistani communities there. Acharya had also been in Montreux, Switzerland, where she designed the wedding of a Dubai-based Punjabi in the hallowed portals of the fabled Montreux Palace Hotel on the shores of Lake Geneva.
She works with a German collaborator, an Italian florist, and a team of dedicated Filipinos, who she says are far more hardworking than Indians. Come December and Acharya and her team will be in Mumbai where they will undertake their first high society wedding in India. The big fat Indian wedding might just have got bigger!
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