About
Nicobar is a New Delhi-based lifestyle brand — a sister label to Good Earth — rooted in contemporary interpretations of Indian culture. Known for its sustainable approach to craft and its distinctive design voice, Nicobar produces seasonal collections across apparel, home textiles, and décor that bridge heritage making traditions with modern living.
“A Valley of Flowers”
Kashmir
Brief
Each Nicobar collection begins with a creative premise — a place, a mood, a cultural moment. For this collection, the brief came directly from the CEO's travels to Kashmir: transport us to spring and summer in the mountains. Colorful, alive, rooted in the flora, fauna, and craft traditions of the region.
The goal was to build a cohesive home textile and décor collection that felt specific to Kashmir — not a generic "Indian craft" gesture, but something that captured a particular landscape and a particular way of life.
My Role
I led the collection from research through execution — responsible for concept development, all original illustration and motif design, product ideation, and collaboration with the sourcing and merchandising teams to bring it to market.
Research and Creative Direction
I spent time researching the visual and cultural landscape of Kashmir: the kingfishers and lotus blooms of Dal Lake, the Shikara boats that serve as floating markets and studios, the heralds and wildflowers of the mountain valleys, and the deep regional relationship with tea — both as ritual and as medicine.
The flora and fauna of the region became the primary visual vocabulary. Every illustration in the collection was hand-painted and hand-sketched by me — then developed into repeat patterns, colorways, and motifs across textiles and décor.
The palette followed the brief: the saturated, almost electric colors of spring in the mountains — pinks, saffron, greens, and blues — rooted in the hues of the region's flowers and birds.
Product innovation — the Kashmir Tea Box
Beyond the textile collection, I identified an opportunity to develop a new product category entirely: a tea storage box designed for the home.
The insight came from the research: Kashmiri culture has a centuries-old relationship with tea — Kahwa, noon chai, the ritual of preparing and sharing tea with guests. Tea isn't just a drink in this region; it's a social object. Yet there was no product in the Nicobar range that honored this.
I developed the concept from ideation through implementation — a decorative wooden box where tea lovers could store and display their collection, use it front-of-house when entertaining, and make the act of serving tea feel intentional and beautiful. The illustrations from the collection were applied directly to the box, making it a functional extension of the broader creative world.
The Kashmir Tea Box launched with the collection and became one of Nicobar's cult products. It remains on the website four years after launch.
Campaign & launch strategy — a brand collaboration
The launch was brought to life through a curated summer brunch experience — a fully styled hosting moment that placed every product from the collection in context: the cushions, the table linens, the Tea Box, the Vadham blend, all arranged around the act of gathering and sharing a meal. The campaign communicated the collection's core proposition — spring in the mountains, the art of hospitality, the beauty of craft — not through copy, but through atmosphere.
To launch the Kashmir collection, we didn't just style a shoot. We built a world.
Recognizing that the Tea Box needed more than a product launch — it needed cultural credibility — I helped develop a brand partnership with Vadham India, one of the country's leading specialty tea purveyors. The idea was simple but deliberate: if the Tea Box was about honoring Kashmir's tea culture, the tea inside it should be just as considered as the box itself.
Working with Vadham, we co-created a custom Kashmiri tea blend — developed specifically to accompany the box at launch. This turned a decorative object into a complete ritual experience: the blend, the vessel, the table it sat on, all speaking the same creative language.
The partnership did several things strategically. It gave the Tea Box a reason-to-believe beyond aesthetics — grounding it in genuine tea culture rather than just visual appeal. It created a co-branded launch moment that extended Nicobar's reach into Vadham's audience. And it positioned the product as the centerpiece of a lifestyle, not just a purchase.
