A bouquet of ideas

Unique Hobbies

Harini Sundar’s love for art and craft started when she was 10. What began as an interest in pottery work, when she was in class five, has now grown into a passion for creating decorative items with stocking material.

Over the years, this engineer, who works with Nokia Siemens Networks in Hebbal, has been experimenting in the world of art and craft.

Although she has not had any formal training in it, she learnt most of it through observation. She developed an interest in pottery work after seeing her neighbour do the same. Ask her why she makes flowers and she says that flowers look the best and are comparatively easier to make.

“It is quite a stress-buster. This hobby really relaxes me especially after a long hard day at work,” she says. It was after watching a video on Youtube that she was inspired to make flowers using stocking material. She made some and the results were clearly encouraging.

“I was intrigued after watching the video, which explained how to go about making these kinds of flowers. After that, I went around hunting for the material,” she says. “I have heard that this is particularly made for Christian weddings in foreign countries,” she says. Like everyone, Harini looks forward to weekends, when she involves herself in this pastime. “I am very calm when I get into this, especially after a tiring week,” she explains.

Once every two weeks, she makes her way to Jayanagar complex, where she carefully chooses the materials required. Harini makes single flowers, bouquets and butterflies using stocking material and wire. It’s a lot of work — making the leaves and the petals, putting the petals together to make the flowers and topping them with pollen.

Explaining the procedure of making a single flower, she says that wire is rolled around a refill and then pulled out. Since the binding wire is very ductile, it can be shaped into a leaf. The stocking material is attached and bound to the edges with thread. A petal is made by putting the wire around a perfume bottle cap and a similar method is followed. Showing one of the butterflies, which doubles up as a magnet, she says that she made this after noticing one in Malaysia. She has also made a hair clip and gifted a similar one to her mother’s colleague. Right now, Harini gifts most of the items what she makes. “Sometimes, friends and relatives ask me to make these for gifting purposes. It’s by word-of-mouth that people know about what I am doing,” she says. “While gifting such items, there is a lot of space to play around with. For instance, colours can be chosen depending on the likes of the person as well as the kind of flowers,” she adds. “Plus, it is a personalised activity and not much expenditure is involved,’’ she chuckles.

However, she is not part of any hobby club. Although she would love to have company while making these items, she says that she hasn’t found anyone else who shares her interest. “I’d love to makes these decorative items along with somebody but I don’t know anybody who would like to do the same,” she adds. Besides, Harini is into pencil-sketching and pottery decoration. In the future, she plans to experiment with junk jewellery. However, she feels that sticking to flower-making might be better since it is something unique. “Most of the time, it’s my friends who assess my work. Based on the feedback, I take it forward,” she signs off.