Creating a creative niche

You need not be qualified to be a professional. Though professional training is desirable, it not a must. All you need is flair and passion, and you will learn to be successful in your chosen field.

That is what Hyderabad-based Bhanu Reddy has proved. She is a software engineer. She worked for an IT firm until recently. But her heart was somewhere else. She had lot of aesthetic sense. One day she decided to say good bye to her software engineering job and plunged into interior designing. Within a year she has over 30 assignments to her credit.

It all started with the interior work she has done for house. Impressed by her work she was flooded with offers from friends and relatives. Demand for consultation had gone up so much that her husband Anand had to quit his job to join Bhanu to help her pursue her dream. During her journey she also won Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2017 August by Indian Achievers Seminar held at New Delhi.

About her journey as a software engineer, she says, "I am from Vijaywada and I shifted to Hyderabad to pursue my master's in computer applications (MCA) as per my family's wishes, eventhough my passion was more on creative side."

Bhanu Reddy's mother took care of her and her two brothers after her father's untimely demise. "We lost my father while I was in college. It was a tough time for us; we went through many hardships. But my mother, who had taken care of us pushed us to study and made us what we are today. My two brothers are settled in software jobs, working in Bengaluru."

She says, "We used to stay in a rented house and my decor would always impress my friends. After two years of our marriage, we bought a spacious 2200sqft 3BHK home, and we invited over guests, colleagues and family for our housewarming. They were all impressed by my designs. One day my husband's colleague called us. She bought a 3BHK house and asked me if I can assist her for interiors. We met the next day, I drew up my plans and gave her the budget. I was able to execute the project within the stipulated time. That is when my husband (Anand Reddy) started insisting that I take this passion to a professional front," she relates.

"These days we hardly find people, who work with heart, dedication and who can own the space and execute work as if we are doing our own home. It is a joy to be able to do good work and see the thrill in client's eyes. It makes us forget all the pain we went through. This inspired us to do more such lovely projects putting our soul into them," she adds.

The inspiration has always been there. As a kid Bhanu was invovled in creative work. She used to paint and help in decorating home, buy home decor from exhibitions and help her mother in festive decoration. And it was indeed a natural transition.

It has been a learning experience for her since the time she took to Interior Designing. About her challenges she says, "When it comes to convincing the clients to the current trends and design aesthetic style, it gets really hard, as they always want some from our previous projects or designs they might have seen in somebody's house.

It takes effort but we convey the message that every home is unique to us and we help designing it differently. Though we take inspiration from a design, we always strive to create a unique design with creative flare and choice of colours. One has to be emotionally strong in this field, as many times we get on toes when client changes the design during the project execution."

Its over an year now, since Bhanu opened her own store 'Enrich Decors'. She shares, "'Enrich Decors' introduces exclusive handcrafted modular kitchens with BWP 710 grade marine plywood and exclusive hardware options to choose from with varies ranges to give flexibility in designing with handcrafted kitchens in combination of robust materials.

With the help of our skilled carpentry team, we customise cots with various finishes like in laminate, leatherate, deco, lacquer finish etc. The store also has artefacts, sourced from different parts of India that are made of natural elements like raisin, copper and mixture of different metals.