Redo Credo I tell the women
I work with to be ferocious, because whether you're a man or a woman, pyaar se you
can't explain to anyone," says interiors consultant Monica Khanna, 32. "That's
the attitude you've got to have with the contractor, the workers, even the client."
It's an attitude -- take it or leave it -- that's worked well for her most prestigious
assignment to date: the Palace on Wheels redone. In its latest avatar, the luxury train
operated by Rajasthan Tourism Development Corporation (RTDC) has a spanking new beauty
parlour and health club, apart from hand-embroidered one-of-a-kind pelmets for each of its
480 windows, Persian silk carpets and a completely transformed bar boasting stools with
brass inlay work, among other things. With two months to do the job ("on a train that
covers 7,500 sq ft," Khanna points out), and a budget that was cut down from Rs 1.75
crore to about Rs 60 lakh, some compromises had to be made. In the bedrooms, for instance,
the bed backs were changed but the beds themselves were not. For the rest, Khanna -- whose
portfolio so far consists mainly of private residences of industrialists -- had a point to
prove. "When I walked in (for the presentation with RTDC officials)," she
recalls, "they ticked me off with this attitude of 'this 22-year-old girl, what can
she do?'" Now they know.
I tell the women
I work with to be ferocious, because whether you're a man or a woman, pyaar se you
can't explain to anyone," says interiors consultant Monica Khanna, 32. "That's
the attitude you've got to have with the contractor, the workers, even the client."
It's an attitude -- take it or leave it -- that's worked well for her most prestigious
assignment to date: the Palace on Wheels redone. In its latest avatar, the luxury train
operated by Rajasthan Tourism Development Corporation (RTDC) has a spanking new beauty
parlour and health club, apart from hand-embroidered one-of-a-kind pelmets for each of its
480 windows, Persian silk carpets and a completely transformed bar boasting stools with
brass inlay work, among other things. With two months to do the job ("on a train that
covers 7,500 sq ft," Khanna points out), and a budget that was cut down from Rs 1.75
crore to about Rs 60 lakh, some compromises had to be made. In the bedrooms, for instance,
the bed backs were changed but the beds themselves were not. For the rest, Khanna -- whose
portfolio so far consists mainly of private residences of industrialists -- had a point to
prove. "When I walked in (for the presentation with RTDC officials)," she
recalls, "they ticked me off with this attitude of 'this 22-year-old girl, what can
she do?'" Now they know.