Designer Abhishek Kaushik makes flowers star of wedding, restaurant decor

Kaushik receives close to all of his clients through word-of-mouth and a close network of designers and decor artists across India. For each project, he builds upwards, focusing on floor plans first and using digital 3Ds max design tools to map dimensions. Most clients request for a fairytale-styled wedding and colour schemes of their choice, however, Kaushik still holds creative freedom in terms of quirky art installations and seasonal choice of flowers.

By chance, Kaushik designed the wedding of a company director from his previous marketing job, after which he says he took up designing full-time. Now with eight years of experience, weddings make a large chunk of his business, averaging at 40-50 functions a year. “My first big break was designing a wedding for the Mandhana family who own the clothing company ‘Being Human’ with Salman Khan. One of the functions was at Maratha Mandir and everything from the ceiling designs to floor plans took a month of planning,” he says.

Since then, he has designed weddings in JW Marriott, Taj Land’s End and other five-star locations all over India. In the last two years, he has notably designed weddings of cricketers Yuvraj Singh and Bhuvneshwar Kumar. Travelling mainly between New Delhi and Mumbai, Kaushik frequents his office in Andheri for meetings with big clients and film groups.

Some of his signature set designs include recycled paper, plastic PVC pipes and eco-friendly materials. (Express Photo by Karma Sonam Bhutia)

He mentions Holland, Netherlands, Thailand and New Zealand as main sources for buying flowers. “I get tulips in bulk from Holland’s ‘Keukenhof’, one of the world’s largest flower gardens. I also get lavender and a special kind of orchid called oncidium from them,” he adds. Using flowers of this quality along with fabrics like lycra, Kaushik makes art installations that serve as décor and interiors.

When asked why he relies on imported flowers, he says that most Indian flowers have weaker stems, poorer shelf-life and can’t survive transportation. “All our high-grade flowers are sold abroad. Top-grade roses that usually come from Tata Flowers, for example, are available as imports for double or triple the cost,” says Kaushik. He has taught classes in Brussels about different flora across countries and their import-export problems as well.

NIFT and NID often invite him for workshops on floral set designing, he says. “I get a lot of calls from design colleges because there is not enough knowledge on the profession. In fact, I don’t know any other floral set designer in India even though weddings are such a big market here,” he adds.

Some of his signature set designs include recycled paper, plastic PVC pipes and eco-friendly materials. One major problem faced by floral designers like Kaushik is waste. “Lakhs of flowers go to waste after a project. That’s why I have tied up with NGOs like Zindagi which use leftover flowers and art materials to make toys, purses and other products.” For big events, he sticks to organic linens instead of satin or synthetic materials that are toxic when exposed to sun and kept out in the open for hours.

After recently becoming an interior landscaping consultant on the side, Kaushik advises people on which plants to keep inside their homes such as gardenias and fici which counter chemicals like formaldehyde released by furniture paint and sofa fabrics. He is currently in the midst of designing a resto-bar set to open in Colaba.