The earthiness of rattan and bamboo has always been a wonderful option for home decor.
The earthiness of rattan and bamboo has always been a wonderful option for home decor. Now Saheba Singh goes further into the weave to tell you how you can make the most of wicker.
To evoke the glorious era of the 1980s with furniture and accessories crafted from wicker and cane furniture, one must traverse the styles that have emerged from whence it sprung. Here, we reimagine wicker furniture for contemporary living. There is something special about materials and forms that evoke nostalgia. Forms that take you back to an era. It makes you revisit the past and relive happy times spent in happy spaces.
Cane and wicker do this for me; take me on a trip down memory lane. While planning to update your home decor, wicker furniture probably isn’t the first choice on your shopping list. It calls to mind an outdated ‘80s home adorned with plaid couches and unpainted wooden furniture. It doesn’t have to be that way, however, you could always add sleek and chic wicker pieces into your homes and tweak it to circa 2018. Or, have an out and out vintage cane piece and place it cheekily between all things contemporary. It makes for an interesting contrast.
Cane furniture, which is also known as wicker, is basically made of stems of the rattan plant. Cane is a versatile and eco-friendly material ideal for both indoor and outdoor furniture and can adapt itself to modern trends and styles to lend an accent to a space.
When it comes to the use of rattan in your interiors there are many reasons to spruce up your home décor with cane. Here are some:
History of wicker
Wicker is such an integral part of the history of man that it is mentioned in the myths of many primitve societies. The Potawatami Indians believed there was an old lady who lived on the moon and weaved baskets. Basketweaving has been a part of so many cultures around the world. The earliest known evidence of the production of wicker furniture date back to the Sumerian civilisation of 4000 BC.
The Sumerians used wicker for shelter, floors, transportation, clothing, furnishings and utensils.
The ancient Romans were found to have a design of wicker furniture similar to their predesessors.
The word wicker is believed to be of Scandinavian origin: wika which means to bend in Swedish, and vikker meaning willow. Wicker is not a material in itself, but rather an overall classification of furniture woven from any one of a variety of materials like cane (rattan), willow, bamboo, reed etc.
The oldest surviving pieces of wicker furniture date from the Egyptian Empire. These pieces include chests made of reed and rush, wig boxes of reed and papyrus, and wicker hassocks and chairs.
— The writer is a prolific interior designer, and director of a reputed design firm that is behind the interiors of Masala Library (Delhi), Social (Delhi), Smokehouse Deli (Delhi), Playboy (Pune), Farzi Cafe (Bangalore), among others.