The Pottery Studio — Seven Months Old and Already the Heart of Aavya

Seven months ago the pottery studio became fully ours. Before that there was a partnership that ran for a while and then didn't. These things happen. What matters is what came after.

Shivani — who has been at Aavya since the very beginning, who has at various points been spa therapist, cooking teacher, property manager, and the person who simply held things together when things needed holding — kept the studio open through the transition. Started giving classes within a week. Kept the wheel turning. Two years at Aavya and this is as much her home as anyone's.

Then Kumar Krishna arrived from Jharkhand three months ago and the studio became something else again. Trained at Shantiniketan — thirteen years in one of India's most serious art institutions. Works across terracotta, ceramics, porcelain, glass. Uses thread, leaves, different glazes, paint. Has a design flair that is immediately visible in everything he touches. And for reasons nobody has fully explained, has a deep obsession with making small animal figurines — goats, creatures, living things in miniature — that sit around the studio watching everything with a quiet presence.

Together, Shivani and Kumar Krishna have given the studio real depth. Around them — Aarti from Jaipur and Shalini from near Badrinath, young and learning fast. And Caroline from Switzerland, who arrived as a guest, learned Ayurveda in Rishikesh and Haridwar, and is now simply part of the fabric of this place.

The Studio Itself

It sits at the heart of the property — literally the centre of Aavya, between the indoor yoga studio in the first building and the open air yoga space on the outer terraces. Second and third terrace. Big arched brick windows. Rustic red walls slowly filling with colour — paintings, art, the accumulated mark-making of everyone who has spent time here. It started as bare brick. It is becoming something else gradually.

From inside you can hear the property living around you. Something being cooked. Music from somewhere. And outside the arched windows, the mountains. Seven months old. Already feeling like the most essential part of the Aavya experience.