The Bombay Carousel is an ode to Mumbai’s most iconic sights that are slowly slipping out of view. Fishing boats rest along a blue shoreline at the base, auto rickshaws and vintage vehicles drive through traffic past a colonnade and landmark buildings like the University of Mumbai, the Rajabai Clock Tower and the Bombay High Court rise on top. Human figures and palm trees punctuate. Twist the hand-crank located near the base and the three-tiered carousel begins to rotate as if mimicking its inspiration—a city where life is always on the move.
“I am fascinated by the idea of creating movement in a static object,” says Priyanka Shah, founder of SHED, a multidisciplinary design studio behind the designs. It was showcased at the recent edition of Homo Faber 2026: An Island of Light—a Biennial in Venice dedicated to handmade artistry—among the works of 30 Indian artisans and crafts ateliers, the result of a collaboration between JSW Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the JSW Group, and the Michelangelo Foundation for Creativity and Craftsmanship. Crafted from wood, brass, glass and other materials, the Bombay Carousel encapsulates the details and playfulness that have made SHED one of the most exciting names emerging in the homegrown design ecosystem.
We really embrace a sense of playfulness and freedom in design. With so many people making different things, there must be a sense of narrative and storytelling in everything we make.”
Priyanka Shah, designer
Over the past few years, SHED has drawn the attention of design enthusiasts, industry insiders and collectors with designs that look like they have been crafted to accent a fairy-tale setting or a fantasy film. Think whimsical carousels that resemble castles, woodlands, libraries and cupcake stands; marble table painted or inlaid with vivid scenes that bring Indian miniature art to mind; glass boxes and columns with multi-coloured bodies that dance in the light. The studio’s carrom boards are highly coveted—made from marble and inlaid with intricate motifs going from flora to fauna to patterns drawn from Patan Patola textiles and Bhutanese heritage.
Now Shah and her team are beginning an ambitious new chapter: the SHED Shop. Launching this month, the shop will offer ready-to-buy items from the studio that is known for its custom designs. It is a decision fuelled by demand as much as personal reflection. “We wanted to start creating things that felt a little more accessible, not just in terms of pricing but more to do with the process. Our designs are custom-built which take a lot of time and conversations. I love making custom designs but we also want to be more prolific,” Shah says. Yet, there will be a sense of exclusivity to the shop which will launch a new drop every three months, consisting of six to eight products made in limited-editions and available only till stocks last.
The first drop comprises a set of desk objects and a festive edit for the season. On offer: a calendar that combines the principles of a magnetic pinboard and a digital clock; a set of miniature rules and measurement tools made from stone, glass and brass; creative kits and storage tools. The festive edit, designed “to honour the season” features an incense holder, a diya set inspired by sweets (which has been named Shagun) and three idols—Lakshmi, Saraswati and Ganesh. There is also a minimalist take on the studio’s signature carrom boards, incorporating marble and a touch of colour. Shah says she’s excited to see what people think of this version.
Games and a sense of playfulness were built into Shah’s practice from the early days in 2014 when she returned home to Surat after graduating with a degree in architecture from the Parsons School of Design in New York. She had grown up in Surat, where her family was engaged in the diamond manufacturing business, before spending a few years of high school in Mumbai followed by New York. After she came back, one of Shah’s early commissions was a school playground project which eventually never materialised. “But we had spent a lot of time exploring how to build it, and that led to a lot of different ideas for me, particularly about traditional Indian boardgames. I was moved by my research and thought about converting it into a furniture line.”
The possibility of embedding boardgames onto the floor of the playground gradually transformed into the design inspiration for a set of tables. Incorporating elements from games like Chaupar, Navkankari and Hasu Chirate Aata into the tables, Shah was scouted through social media to showcase at the 2016 London Design Fair along with other established Indian designers. She recalls being the youngest of the lot but it gave her a global showcase opportunity early in her career.
Since then, the studio has gradually evolved with more opportunities, experiments and material interventions. Shah calls her practice a work in progress—growing organically with each project and experiment. “The multi-disciplinary approach stems from the fact that I genuinely love exploring different materials and making meaning out of them,” she says. “I pieced together all the resources at my disposal bit by bit. As I went about understanding how to work with them, I also started getting artisans and designers into the studio. We learnt on the job.”
The studio’s location is also an unusual choice. Surat is known for its diamond factories and textile manufacturing units but it doesn’t have the reputation of being a design hub. It’s a growing market but Shah remembers being a design label “existing in a vacuum” when she began 12 years ago. Yet Surat also offered her the luxury of being home and finding adequate space to conceive a sprawling creative operation. As the label’s reputation has grown, SHED has expanded to a team of 45 people, including artists, designers and artisans. Many of the artisans in the studio are immigrants, from states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Odisha, who arrive in Surat seeking work in its factories and construction areas. “The artisans did not arrive at the studio with learned artisanal skills. Most of them came from urban construction sites and had basic skills. Our work involved a lot of handholding as well,” Shah adds.
Being in Surat, however, allowed Shah to experiment with materials and equipment in ways she would likely not find anywhere else—specifically, her family ’s diamond factory. “While we have learnt to work with materials in traditional ways, we have also tried to test their limits. What could we do with different types of infrastructures? We use a lot of the infrastructure that comes from the diamond industry,” she says. “For instance, to work with glass on a diamond lapping wheel is a gamechanger because we are able to bring in a lot more precision and control.” Wood was the first material Shah extensively worked with—pivoting from carpentry to woodturning and making use of a precision lathe used for metals to work on the material. The mix of traditional techniques and “hands-on infrastructural hacking” has defined SHED’s work across materials. It’s a constant learning curve, observes Shah, but a spirit of joy courses through the process.
It culminates in singular products that conflate research with innovation. At the 2026 edition of India Art Fair, the studio showcased a variety of items, including a fabric cabinet dyed in varied shades of indigo and punctuated with marble and brass. Another design was a glass cabinet, crafted from wood and marble with hand-cast glass bricks as the material hero and modular features. The play of materials gives SHED a distinctive edge across designs—be it a wooden altar box for one client or a marble inlay butsudan (a Japanese wooden cabinet) for another to store her scrolls, a foosball kit or installations of trees and landscapes. The studio has also collaborated with an array of brands and establishments: Mumbai-based restaurant Papa’s, coffee chain Subko and design store Nilaya Anthology among others.
Design from SHED Shop’s First Drop
Design from SHED Shop’s First Drop
Design from SHED Shop’s First Drop
And then, there are the carousels which began around 2021 with a commission from a family friend. Shah says she didn’t promise anything beyond giving the idea a shot. It took close to six months but the team delivered. “The minute we figured out how it works, we had more ideas of what we could do next. We were in a very experimental zone—we were making even smaller pieces but upping the themes and stories,” she says, adding that people also seemed eager to commission such designs. “The big breakthrough happened when we made the Old City Carousel [in 2024], a 7.5ft tall piece which was commissioned by a family. It was when we realised that we loved making these larger-than-life-pieces. And to lend movement to such a piece is phenomenal.”
“I pieced together all the reow to work with them, I started getting artisans and designers into the studio. We learnt on the job.”
Priyanka Shah
Shah and her team have translated an astounding variety of ideas into carousels. The Library Carousel features dozens of miniature books lined across the shelves with a spiral staircase reaching the top and a garage below. The Sone Ki Chidiya—a design commissioned for Prime Minister Narendra Modi—featured the titular golden birds soaring over a monument composed of stepwells, a chakra, coins and indigo-dyed embroidered textiles. Commissioned designs have included one inspired by jungle safaris, another from a collection of objects, interest and hobbies for a client’s 65th birthday.
Will carousels make it to the SHED Shop’s inventory? It’s certainly on the cards. With new drops planned for every quarter, the team will gather consumer feedback and assess the response to the retail model over the next year. Shah, who now lives in Amsterdam and travels frequently to Surat, is also working on newer commissions and projects that continue to evoke nostalgia and joy in a challenging world.
Shah’s creative ethos stems from a desire to imbue a feeling of wholesomeness into the most intimate spaces that people inhabit. At SHED, every project is a world in itself—guided by conversations with clients, research into materiality and motifs and a thoughtful making process. “We really embrace a sense of playfulness and freedom in design,” says Shah. “With so much going on in the world and so many people making different things, there must be a sense of narrative and storytelling in everything we make.” Design objects are often distinguished by their utilitarian qualities and certainly their aesthetics. But at SHED, they also come with an emotional core—from the carousel that holds a crowd in thrall to desk objects that transform the mundane into the magical.
