Weise, was the architect who designed the Hotel de l’Annapurna. Talking about fathers and such, it is interesting to know that Sonia’s maternal great grandfather Samuel Evans Stokes, a Quaker from Pennsylvania, introduced apple trees in Shimla in 1903, and thereby made Himanchal Pradesh into one of the biggest apple producing states in India. Besides being a social worker, he She finished her B.F.A in 1991 and surprisingly, did not start any work professionally for almost five years. “I got married,” she laughs. “And then my daughter was born, so I became pretty busy at home.” But destiny was only waiting to play its part. In 1995, the wellknown architect, Shiban Ganju, requested her to be his interior design consultant for two residential projects - that of industrial biggies, Khaitan and Goenkaboth in New Delhi. “You can imagine, I must have been blessed to have had such distinguished clients for my first professional works.” From then on it has been a busy ride, and her firm, Sonia Gupta and Associates, went on to do a lot of prestigious projects including, also joined Gandhi in the freedom struggle and such was his stature in preindependent India that his life’s story entitled the publication of a book called ‘An American in Khadi’. How fitting also that Sonia was born on the 15 th of August- India’s Independence Day. Sonia reveals, “Actually my real name is Vandana”. Supposedly, during the five years of her B.F.A. Interior Design and Art Education in the University of Georgia, USA, people found it difficult to pronounce her name. So she began using her nickname, Sonia. She has also done a one-year Advertising and Applied Arts from College of Art, New Delhi. offices of PSA Legal Eagles in Delhi and New York, a NRI residence in New York, the Bandhavgarh Jungle Lodge, and the Opus in Delhi. However, with a growing list of Kathmandu projects including the Hotel de l’Annapurna and residences of HRH Princess Helen Shah and Kapil S.J.B. Rana, it does look like Sonia might well be as busy here. Half jokingly, she says, “I would love to build a cottage for myself in Kathmandu, but I hear land prices are over the roof!” She has built a small cottage recently in Shimla, which she visits occasionally. Sonia has had an exhibition of her computer graphics at the Guggenheim Museum in New York and another at the Lyndon Art Centre in Georgia. She was also a recipient of the Georgia Rotary Scholarship. And besides ranking 27 th in the All India Order of Merit in the Class XII Board Exams, Sonia also topped the State of Delhi in Art. She describes her Above & left: Two of Sonia’s recent works – Vineyard in Baber Mahal Revisited and Jeans Café in Basantpur specialization as Interior Architecture and believes that it would be proper and in the scheme of things if architects would work alongside interior designers as consultants. From her experience, Sonia believes that it is very important to be professional in dealings with clients but rues the fact that there are still many who do not understand the time and effort an interior designer has put in to arrive at a point of mutual satisfaction. Sonia says she is quite selective when accepting assignments and likes to have her interest aroused by challenging projects in which she is allowed a free hand to unleash her latent creativity. She says, “Working here has been a pleasure but it has been difficult as well.” Elaborating further, she adds, “Sometimes it is impossible to get the kind of materials I need and even when available, not in the requisite amounts. I do wish concerned importers would consult interior designers when ordering so that they have adequate stocks of required and in-vogue materials. This would make our task so much easier and prevent unnecessary delays in the finishing of projects.” S 68 SEP-OCT 2005 SPACES
SPACES SEP-OCT 2005 69