Virtual tour

India

In India, Art Deco transformed the lives of a westernized princely elite and the urban middle class.

The Maharajah of Indore fashioned a taste for Art Deco by commissioning works from leading European designers for his palace, Manik Bagh. At Umaid Bhawan, the Maharajah of Jodhpur fused western and Indian decorative conventions in a European-designed scheme executed by Indian craftsmen. The result was one of the most sumptuous Art Deco palaces ever built.

Bombay, like many cities, saw its seafront developed with a strip of chic, Art Deco apartment buildings. In India the modern apartment block signalled new ways of living, as many young Indians abandoned the multi-generation home in favour of western lifestyles.

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