TRUST ME I KNOW WHAT I'm DOING

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Hey friends, this is Abhay Dandekar. Before we get started, don't forget to subscribe to Trust Me I Know What I'm Doing on YouTube, Amazon, Spotify, Apple, or wherever you listen or watch. That way you never miss our show celebrating the vibrant Indian and South Asian global experience. Thanks!

This is Abhijit Bansod. I call myself a cultural designer. I'm a founder at Studio ABD in Bangalore, India. this is, trust me, I know what I'm doing.

My name is Abhay Dandekar and I share conversations with talented and interesting individuals linked to the global Indian and South Asian community. It's informal and informative, adding insights to our evolving cultural expressions, where each person can proudly say, trust me, I know what I'm doing.

So periodically on Trust Me I Know What I'm Doing, we share a spotlight conversation and feature brief chats with an individual or a group from the community about a special topic or a unique endeavor. Now we talk a lot these days about the soft power of India and the effect it has on a global stage. I mean it seems more and more like that cultural power has had a profound impact on hearts, minds, memories, and markets throughout the world. I often have wondered about how this all has been designed.

about the vision it takes to create the ideas, and about the execution required to bring tradition to life in a way that both feels new and has lasting impact. Thankfully, to help guide us, I shared a conversation with Abhijit Bansod, a visionary designer who's been orchestrating a beautiful harmony between so many elements of everyday Indian life with thoughtful, modern design. Growing up in Nagpur in India, he drew inspiration from daily sights and stories.

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eventually shaping his path through the National Institute of Design and a decade at Titan Industries where he helped bring Indian storytelling into watchmaking. After launching Studio ABD in Bangalore, Abhijith has committed to creating products that aren't just functional, but tell rich poetic stories, whether it's a lamp inspired by street culture or accessories that celebrate Indian craft or offering mobility solutions to local street entrepreneurs.

His studio's philosophy is to blend humor, emotion, and local culture with innovation, making even the simplest objects, reminders of Indian tradition and joy. With many honors and accolades, Abhijit is widely respected for work that connects deeply with users, and he also serves as a decorated ambassador of contemporary Indian design. Abhijit believes that products aren't just consumable, but that they're animated anecdotes to help connect everyone to a holistic design experience.

So as we caught up to chat about everything from trends and nostalgia to thinking like a designer and the optimism that that takes, I was so curious to know how as a designer, Abhijit approaches something as simple as how to first introduce himself to people.

I think there are, I mean, of course, my being professional designer, that tag comes in the front. That's given me things I do, the identity, opportunities to really build something. But I think I'm an entrepreneur, I'm a maker, I'm a storyteller. And one craft I have learned technically and a tool I have mastered is through design. So I use design. I'm a designer. I'm a cultural designer. You I love, know, sometimes I'm kind of

building some new vocabulary around me that I would like to be known for like that where I could build new narratives from Indian way of life, building products and systems. I started writing recently. So, you know, I mean, that's one, something big I'm an amateur writer, you know, and designer is my profession. I use design for everything I do to give that sophistication and simplicity.

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inform our storytelling or design so that people can identify themselves or their way of life and feel that it's emerged out of something they know around them.

That's a wonderful, holistic approach to, as you mentioned, someone who is a cultural designer, because it takes so many different elements of storytelling and making and creating, but also being respectful to the environment around you, whether that be culture or the, in a anthropologic way, or for that matter, in a natural way for you right now, as a designer, would you say that given that backdrop of

storytelling and making and trying to absorb the cultures around you from so many different elements. Would you say that the way that you just described what you do and design being sort of the vehicle or the accelerant towards your expression of that, do you view the world somewhat differently? And by the way, synergistically, therefore, does the world, given what you just described, does the world also view you differently?

Absolutely. Yes. I mean, I write something and I call it IC Design because it's written on my frame. I only see through framework of design. profession of design is naive. It's kind of kid-like, innocent to it because it really focuses on possibilities and it focuses on human beings. You I'm not an artist. I'm not doing it for my inner journey. And of course, I I wouldn't say I'm not. My work doesn't involve art. Yes, it does. But I think...

For me, my view is always been through design plus lens, that how I can change. It's 24-7. If I'm looking at right now, the products in front of me and back of my mind, my algorithm going on how I can improve this because something is shaking, something is not all right. If it's on a street, if it's on an airplane, it's on a train, there's immense opportunities. Everything is opportunity to improve, know, to evolve to next sophisticated level.

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make evolve to next level of its experience. So yes, I think that's been my filter to see the world. And maybe because I've been always like this, it's just that I acquired different tools. I was a maker, so I used to make things by hand and I joined engineering thinking that I will be a mechanical engineer so I can be a true designer.

then I realized that no, there's something called design profession. Then I joined, you know, I went to NID Amdabad. I think that whole journey of reaching to that destination went through very fundamental things of seeing opportunity, seeing, visualizing something and getting different tools at different time to execute that. I mean, of course, today I'm at probably different level of those visualization and execution of that. So yes, so I think my view is absolutely design filtering.

I'm curious, so then if you're someone who is in that very, you know, again, holistic mindset of looking at the world from the vantage point of improvement and how, how can you shape it differently? What does this, how does it fit into a new thing? That means that there's a lot of motion involved both for the world around you and for you internally. But so I'm curious for you, how do you then view things from a being content?

standpoint? Are things ever meant to be content and immobile and static as opposed to dynamic in that way?

I think jokingly in fraternity of design, I call it a curse of being a know, that you're never happy with anything, with your own work, because the poison one and the poison two already started in your mind. So I think it's a continuous improvement and it's flow of seeing something, imagining that world and all.

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Right.

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finding ways to kind of visualize and then finding means to execute that, whether through your own self or writing on brands or writing on organizations or using the distribution of government. I mean, there's so many opportunities we have that to do. And so that all become the medium, but you are never satisfied. mean, that's something I wish I had that closure at the end of the day, but it's never.

I don't know what that closure means. Because I'm always in a flow and always in a flux of things. And I'm very comfortable with that state. So it's not that it disturbs me. I think it's that to who I am. It's that motion of being constantly pushed. Maybe when I sleep, that's the only time I'm hopefully not dreaming and visualizing something.

You mentioned though the word art. mean, I'm imagining that those expressions are, constantly in your mind and they're how they manifest, you know, when we're awake versus when we're dreaming, there there's so much there. I'm, I'm always thinking about this aspect of things. You know, I love your shirt that you're wearing right now, right? That there's, you can't spell design without desi. And the idea that that's embedded in

thinking with that in mind and whether it's been with Titan, whether it's been with a Studio ABD or Mubi or Tiguna, what separates Indian design philosophy and thinking and principle from the trend, from temporary movement, from things that don't necessarily have

great cultural anchors. How do you separate out the philosophy perhaps from the motion sometimes that may actually surround design where it is fleeting? It's very popular, but it's not necessarily steeped in either philosophy or in principle.

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It's very tough, know, I mean, I think it started from, you know, there's a little history to how I sort of identified this Desi in design, you know, in a journey where I still think Indian when we found, you know, my entire time in Titan, Titan Design Studio from 98 to 2008 was really finding what does it mean in time? What is Indian?

How can I bring India to timekeeping? And really amazing, open almost platform by one of the finest companies in the world for designers and for everyone. It's Tata and Titan both together in on that. So it really helped me bring India to really different storytelling from crafts, working with the Indian handicrafts and working with the clock collection in 98, working on

world.

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bringing pop culture of Indian streets, know, I mean, from samosa to Maharashtrian chatti to, you know, or chapal to bhaum. Everything came on watches, you know, and then it's kind of really iconizing our daily life. know what MTV did in some way in that kind of bringing into product design, because product design is very influenced by manufacturing, very influenced by technology.

If you really today, it's all defined by amazing gadgets, perfect finishes, you know. So it's never seen as a communication device. It's seen as a functional device form follows function form, then become form follows emotions, and that's how you started bringing stories of thinking that I think that gave a lot of confidence that I could convert our daily life into tangible.

pop culture which also makes money for builds a brand, know, and it connects with people so well, because it's daily part of our life. Then the Heritage Collection was really finding what does timelessness in the timekeeping. And it was the collection inspired by history, mean, journey of Indian architecture from, you know, Hindu, different influences in India, And that's Hindu architecture, then, you know, Rajputana, then Islamic architecture, then colonial architecture.

So that entire journey was a collection and it was really beautiful. took seven years to launch. 2001 I did that and 2007 companies said okay we're gonna launch it this year. It was my own initiative. It was never a bean front diet. So I asked Bhaskar who was a managing director at that time that why now? I've been showing this for the last seven, eight years. It was a very interesting thing he said. They said that now India is ready for India.

because then we, that time we could travel abroad and see so much of India influence started popping in everywhere, know, like food or Bollywood or yoga and Ayurveda and all that. And I think we needed that almost recognition from somewhere which have lived that thing in. But I think that's really part of how we want. But that really did really well. And then there was a palace collection after that, which was probably most expensive watches in 2010 ever.

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It was like $10,000 of work, each watch limited edition, solid gold, inspired by beautiful palaces of India. I think so that journey of finding Indian design vocabulary was something in my mind when I started my career. I mean, I won't say that it was so definite and thing, but it was that's the only thing I knew. I don't think I could do Italian collection or French collection because I never lived that life.

My life has been childhood ruins in Bhosla period architecture, know, and old British barracks and 250 year old lake and know, jumping in that.

I love that notion of experiential understanding, and those are anchors now that lead to a philosophy as opposed to simply trends.

Yeah. So the Desi part started, you know, I realized that India is very difficult to define, you know, because we are 29 different subcultures and actually, you know, they're not linked to each other at many times, you know, language, the way we live are trying to be together. So define something as an Indian is the conflict of discussion, you know, all of us, because each one of us sees very differently. Somebody works in craft center, she's designed differently.

Somebody works in fashion sees a different thing. Somebody works in technology sees that differently. Then I realized that it's not Indian design vocabulary, but I could be local in where I stand. And hence the word desi, which is hidden in design, was something I brought my focus in saying that that is something you can do. I can tell the local stories and that could become global. And collection of all these local stories.

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would be something called Indian design. The way India has very diversified views about what is right and what is wrong. So if we could be able to build a power through the power of design, celebrate the local stories and local elements, I think that is something I would be very happy that that philosophy can connect to any region, not necessarily India, whether it's entire South East Asia or...

Any culture is local culture, right? You I mean, you try to bring it. And I think that something is what the core of India is that each local culture can become, you know, a very popular one or could become a very, very powerful one to change the behavior of people, know, the way they live or they see the life. So for me, I think it's more Desi-ness and Desi-pao, which is the local.

is far important than something put together as one word called Indian. So, collection of Dixie stories is Indian for me.

I really appreciate that because again, the idea of a local lens being brought to a global stage, that being the sort of philosophic or principle-based anchor for your work really, really resonates. And as you mentioned, the timing is always necessary because India or the culture needs to be ready for itself. And once that is blooming as we know that it is right now, maybe then those principles are

ready to not only just take on the world, but continue to evolve really well. You mentioned one thing that's that I find really fascinating. When we think about human centered design, it's so integrated and harmonizing all these anchored cultural icons and all the nostalgia that goes with it. But they also have to fit very functional, make sure that functional outcomes are also at the core of things, as well as the aesthetics.

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So in a nation where we have lots of humans and such a diversity of so many different dense populations where village to village, the culture may be so dramatically different. And yet, as you mentioned, something that is in one local corner, hopefully is resonating on a global stage. What have you had to unlearn about yourself as a designer in order to find success?

in implementing this kind of philosophy.

It's a very egoistic profession, know, because you're almost visualizing the world, influencing every element of that. It's become me, myself and me, in the work, the expression. It's a powerful tool. you know, think abstraction level or bringing me into the product versus I get really inspired by very good filmmakers, you know, because, know, it's really about that narrative. It's about that script. It's about...

bringing emotion to a viewer. It's really point of view of viewers, know, it makes you cry or it makes you laugh. But products, you don't cry or laugh, you know, there's no protest on the street because of a product design. Because we are so boring, you know, sometimes, you know, so it's, still defined by industry. It's too defined by function, you know, and it's too defined by oversimplification of relationship with object and product. In India, I think I feel that

We live an inconvenient life, know. Conviniences cause lot of trouble medically to our life today. We need inconvenience to work on that. And I think that's something in a way, relationship with objects. I'm sure you remember, the only solution we had to repair our TVs to really give a whack on is that. And we had a strange relationship with objects around us.

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And it worked and most often it worked. I think that is what really I see the relationship with the functionality. If it's love, then no convenience or inconvenience matters. You just want to just do it. So if we could find that kind of a connect with objects and it's so difficult today being we are part of this consumeristic.

Yeah. Movement, you know, which looks like it's not going to stop. Our relationship with objects, know, a few touch of feet on our book, we used to almost say sorry to it by, Pranam Karki. It's, I think, I don't know how much that part could bring it into still a daily life with the next generation. Functionality, I don't really, you know, of course there are some products need to be functional when it's really critical stage of that. But

People are extremely intelligent to figure out things, especially in India where nothing works. So it's given in your mind that I need to improvise, I need to figure out, I need to hustle, you know, on everything around. It's a jugada, you know, that whole work came through that.

Do you need to actually let go of the ego part a lot when it comes to, again, having respect for and even sort of a reverence for that jugard piece, that idea that precision and perfection aren't always going to be the case when it comes to, you know, outlining a product.

Yes, definitely. Yes, most Indians don't like jugat, you know, because it doesn't come with the benchmark of Western sophistication. Most people, you know, we don't like the streets, they're so dirty and there are, you know, I mean, and then genuinely dirty. Our ability to live with problem is we should get all awards for that, okay, in the world, know, for that. It's unreal. It's unreal that, how can you live with problem for so long?

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I see it as opportunities and that's how the Tiguna was born, know, which is, I mean, it was just really changing Indian street, the lowest denominator, which you people don't like in the nice looking cars we're driving in beautiful gated communities we stay in. But the street is the real epitome, real, real reflection of how we want, know, in terms of discipline, in terms of objects there, in terms of infrastructure.

In terms of just cultural awareness that I need to keep my little store so clean and nice. don't need to live in a hotel. Government can't do much on that. It's a very cultural thing. But if you give good tools to them, know, they're starting only with very, very makeshift thing. And they succumb to that makeshift thing. And no one sees opportunity because there's no money in that one. Only government is what can really improve, either infrastructure or support them financially or...

any programs of know livelihoods and things like that. But I think my idea was to really, if I could make streets beautiful, India will, and then that whole journey of culture of aesthetics starts coming in, know, and which is not necessarily linked to economic development. If you go to far eastern countries, or south-eastern Asian countries, Thailand and Cambodia, Vietnam, just the sense of

engagement between how a coconut comes to you with little umbrella and little orchid and everything. It's the same amount you're gonna buy that in India but that doesn't happen here because it's not part of, I don't know, we grew up seeing something, know, aesthetics, culture of aesthetics. don't live in that. We don't go to museum and sit there and look at that painting, you know.

you know, as someone who is a leader in this space and you're constantly looking at the opportunity all around you, right? Whether it's the opportunity that that lives in beauty and cleanliness, or it's the opportunity that lives in chaos. Both of those are always a kind of creative tension between the harmony of nostalgia for yesterday and the nod for innovation for tomorrow. So as a leader,

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How have you found your kind of synchronization of both of them?

I think, are you mentioning about the past and the future, like nostalgia as my own thing? Okay.

Yeah, I mean, the idea that there's so much of, you know, cultural design, especially for India, that is just absolutely, as you mentioned, you know, a nod to the past, to tradition, to legacy, to culture, to this idea and notion of, of what we live with all the time. And then there is the whole idea of what could be what's the possibility, what's the innovation that brings us

perhaps to tomorrow that looks very, very different. How do you maybe marry both of those together as a cultural designer and as a leader in cultural design?

I think so this entire series of writing, is speculation of connecting called past forward, know, so I bring the past and you know, see in reflection of that in coming years, you know, and the nostalgic India is probably going to die with our generation. My daughter don't have the same kind of nostalgic India. She's just a global citizen almost and I like so many of them in cities at least on that, know. Yeah. So

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How do we reflect that? And I keep asking that, know, 15 year old, what does Desi mean to you? I mean, of course, you know, write, but there are really popular ideas about being Desi. There are really popular ideas about very bad examples of being Desi. You again, there are so many meaning which is coming out of that. So looking at the past, if I could reflect and extrapolate that and create a certain system. So one of my

I mean one of the system design which I had done in 2001, was called Karmometer and it was about kind of bringing consumption with the self-regulated system of monitoring, know that. It's a very simple karma but technology helps you to in cash or pay for it in your this life and not the next one. So then you look at

Brahma, Vishnu, Mahesh, is, know, creation, maintenance and destruction. And we are celebrating creativity so much right now that we're only consuming and creating. Neither we are maintaining nor we are properly ending that or finding a closure to that. There's not a closed loop thing and that should circular economy pushes you to really think through that. And those concepts are so part of our life, you know, if you really think about 25 years back.

Now it's so difficult to even practice by yourself because your entire ecosystem doesn't even support them. So for me, I think just keep going back in past, pick up those few elements and try to build a narrative around. But I don't think I can complicate too much because I like familiarity and modernity space where people should see something there and then only they become participants.

they don't become consumer, you know. So if I could pick those elements and, you know, put it together. So I'm project I'm working on because they see food. Indian flowers are in abundance. They are not stem flowers. They're not long sticks like when you come, I come to your home. If I have to get half kg of jasmine, how do I bring it to you? How do you, none of you was, you know, actually allow you to do it, you know, like only form, you know, that way.

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Okay, yeah.

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So I'm thinking that how do I bring popular, I bring this which is abundantly available. How do I celebrate this abundance, know, how do I celebrate, you know, things so working on products, which I can bring it to you working on wasses, which are celebrate this abundance, working on systems where the nearest account sitting can be part of this economic development that you know, through app, she gets ordered and she delivers that and you know, and just become like one very ecosystem at work. So

that modernity and familiarity. If you could really bring that together, it's a good start. Of course you can push the boundaries and as a designer, for me, seeing them being part of your journey and they're adding the value and they're owning something bigger than you thought, the ownership in your mind. I think that is really humbling experience when I see that happening, when it's through products or whether it's for systems you create here.

I think of the, that's a wonderful example of the flowers, right? mean, I think of a gazira that perhaps my grandmother made, right? Beautiful, but it's impossible to present that as a, as a gift, right? As a, as a bouquet, you can't necessarily order that or flower that. And yet actually why not? Right? I mean, that example of finding the nostalgia that we kind of yearn for, whether you're, you know, 15 or 50.

the age of that actually is, relatively timeless and it would be nice to see, course, how would you actually be able to modernize that both from a product standpoint, but also from a design standpoint that goes into that productization of it. I have two other thoughts that I wanted to ask you. mean, obviously all of this thinking has taken practice. When you think back on how this has evolved for you, whether it's writing, whether it's designing, whether it's

infusing culture in all of this. How do you think differently today compared to when you were perhaps first starting out? When you first started thinking like a designer versus today, what's changed?

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I think initially it was a lot about the craft of creation. Learning through materials, you're learning through forms, you're learning through control you have, that how much in my mind I'm imagining that story is actually crafted in that form. How you are perceiving it as a user, know, what I'm trying to do. I think using that gap between the...

outcome and imagination and imagining the impact. And then you do lot of things which are easy to digest. depth starts coming in as you spend more years on that one. You start connecting very different dots, know. Then it was excitement of creating, the excitement of variety of products and experiments you do and learn from it, what works and really, you know, in that sense. today.

I think it's really about, you know, I mean, there are a lot of peasant designers, evolution, not evolution. Like, you very important is portfolio, pencil, then presentations and starts evolving and then becomes projects, know, half of life goes on, you what project you're working on. Right. Then little bit you learn at various something called profit that, I need to also earn money.

Right.

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Finance is always, it's never a part of your thinking. You don't get up and think business. You get up and think opportunities. At some point you reach a purpose, you know, and then say, okay, let me find that purpose. And I think you find that purpose at some point. Earlier the better. But some people do find it much, earlier. But I did a lot of experimentation, went across many things to come to close to seeing that where I stand,

what I do, where I come from, has so many immense number of stories to be told to the world. They would love to hear and they would love to practice and change their way of life because we truly practice this sustainable way of life in all aspects, you cultural sustainability, to human sustainability, to environmental sustainability. Now it comes back in very refined, new glossy words.

And I said, God, this we've been practicing for all our life. So that just kind of closes a loop saying that, yes, I think we can influence the world in positive way. And India always done, know, the soft power from India was far bigger than any export we have done ever, you know, and that, and of course, people like who lived abroad would have showcased and practiced and that goes thing. So I think the biggest soft power today is from India could be one of them. The next is designing.

where this Indian design which simplifies certain things of way of life for global citizen to practice sustainable life, would say.

Let me get you out of here on this. that is thinking a little bit about all the lovely things you just described, asking so many questions, aiming for some of those answers, whether it's through writing, whether it's through cultural design. But when someone is engaging with your work, either on your team or as a consumer, as an observer, as a user of your design, of your writing, when they are engaging with your work, how do you hope they feel?

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Most often, my work gives a tremendous confidence to many Indians, designers, or users that we can not only celebrate our way of life, we can build enterprises or businesses around that because it's a very powerful idea. We have a large country with a large user base today. So we don't need to export anything and still you can do wonderful business in this country today.

I mean, we're fortunate that we are in that situation today. And they identify that feel good about themselves, you know. It's just that we are more and more not in an arrogant way, but I feel that we don't need a Western certification of what we do. But we want to be equal in that. You contributed through science and technology and continuously improved. We want to bring our past 5,000-year-old experiences.

with again science and technology. But science and technology is appropriate in what needs to be done in that time. But still be at the core remain Indian, remain very desi about what we do. think identifying that and extremely feeling proud of where we come from. That's something, know, we've lost that, you know, through British Raj and something, you know, it just didn't happen. just, you know, I mean, we, of course we can use as a defensive mechanism of 5,000, know, these three, know.

confidence of things started coming in, know, and now every year of last 75 years it would have built. If design can add a small contribution to even better, which has a visual manifestation, it's not only words, because that's the power what we bring in as a design. I think that's something I would be very happy if I could add to contribute to that section of visual confidence, of pride of where we come from.

Well, whether it's pride and confidence instilling that sense of great identity and most importantly, with that pride and confidence in design comes asking the questions of who we are, where we've been and where we're going. These are all wonderful questions for everyone to be asking. And we're so glad that you're bringing this all to the forefront. Abhijit, thank you so much for joining us today. What a treat this was and we wish you all the best.

Speaker 2 (35:12.834)
Thank you so much Abhay for inviting me. It's really, really great to have you being here and having conversations.

Thanks so much Abhijit, and we put all the links to his work in the episode notes. Big shout out to Deepa Prahlad Abhyankar for the spark. And if you enjoyed this episode of Trust Me I Know What I'm Doing, make sure to subscribe for free on YouTube, Spotify, Amazon, Apple Podcasts, or your favorite app so you never miss a story, celebrating the rich and diverse Indian and South Asian experience. Love the conversation? Please leave us a review and definitely share it with your friends and family. Till next time, I'm Abhay Dandekar.