Iron Grille Door Sideboard in Weathered Timber

• Sheesham, hand finished, weathered polish.
• 4 drawers across the top, 4 doors below.
• Cast iron jali set into every door.
• Forged iron knobs and drop latches.
• Made in our workshop in Jodhpur.

The pattern on the iron is older than anybody in our workshop. It is the one on the window grilles of the old city, the same scrolls and the same row of little balusters you see on every jharokha in the lanes below the fort and it has been cast from the same kind of mould for longer than our family has been making furniture.

The Iron Came First

In our grandfather's time the grilles came from the kabadi. When an old haveli came down, the window jalis went to the scrap yard and he would go and pick the good ones and build a cupboard around each one. That is how this piece started, with the iron. Today the lohar casts them for us from moulds taken off those old grilles, so the pattern is the same one to the scroll and the wood is built to fit the iron. Every door on this sideboard was cut to the grille that sits in it, which is why the 4 doors on one piece are alike and the next piece comes out with it's own measurements.

Then The Wood

Once the 4 grilles are chosen the khati starts. The carcass is sheesham, jointed by hand and the door frames are cut to the iron, then the drawers above are sized to the doors below so the lines run straight across the front. The knobs on the drawers are pyramid iron, forged and the doors close on iron drop latches, the kind that make a sound when you lift them. The polish is rubbed on and rubbed off again so the wood looks like it has already been in a house for a long time, which is what people who buy this piece want it to look like.

A grille in a cupboard door does what it always did, it lets air through to whatever is kept inside and it lets you see the good plates without opening anything.