Collaboration brings eight furniture pieces in American red oak and cherry to India’s design fair.
Re-editions, a collaboration between the American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC) and Bangalore-based furniture manufacturer Phantom Hands, was unveiled at the second edition of Design Mumbai, which opened on 26 Nov and ran until 29 Nov 2025. The collection comprised eight pieces of furniture made in American red oak or cherry, designed by x+l, Inoda + Sveje, Australian architect and furniture maker Adam Markowitz, and the late Sri Lankan architect Geoffrey Bawa.
The project built on Refractions, an earlier cross-cultural collaboration that introduced Phantom Hands to American hardwoods and to Markowitz. That initiative resulted in a small series of furniture and lighting that explored layered wood bending, a technique well-suited to American red oak, cherry and maple. Phantom Hands said the precision and sustained focus required deepened its understanding of the material characteristics of these species.
“It was based on this experience that we decided to introduce American cherry and red oak into our current catalogue, for x+l, Inoda + Sveje and especially the colored pieces in the Bawa Collection,” said Deepak Srinath, co-founder of Phantom Hands. “A number of these were originally made with tropical hardwoods that are now difficult to source ethically or banned for export. Given the environmental credentials of American hardwoods, it made sense for us to incorporate them into our existing collections.”
At Design Mumbai, the eight pieces were presented within a purpose-built pavilion organised around a strict grid, with independent floor, ceiling and wall modules. The geometry of layered fabric panels and the demountable structure referenced Phantom Hands’ roots in Chandigarh’s modernism — notably Corbusier’s brise-soleil screens and Jeanneret’s furniture, such as the periodicals bookcase and demountable chair. The pavilion was designed by Bangalore-based architect David Joe Thomas, made from American hard maple and crafted by Phantom Hands.
The structure was designed to be assembled on-site and dismantled after the fair, requiring it to be light, transportable and easy to construct. It also needed to use American maple, the last of three hardwood species donated by The Rossi Group that Phantom Hands had not yet explored, while reflecting the company’s design language and history. The pavilion aimed to connect an unfamiliar timber to the mid-century modernist moment in India from which Phantom Hands emerged.
“Our decision to work with Phantom Hands was all about encouraging an accomplished and well-respected Indian furniture manufacturer to experiment with US hardwoods,” said Roderick Wiles, AHEC regional director. “We knew that this would be a challenge, given that their work was all in teak and that temperate American hardwoods not only look different, but behave very differently as well.”
“After many months of experimentation, knowledge transfer and a successful collaboration, Phantom Hands were more than willing to adopt American hardwoods into their body of work and across their collections,” he added. “Bringing this to Design Mumbai was an obvious thing to do, as it would give us an opportunity to show India’s design community what is possible.”
The Re-editions collection included the Saddle Chair, Bentota Dining Chair and Bentota Lounge Chair in American red oak, designed by Geoffrey Bawa Practice; the x+l 14 Full Circle Coffee Table in red oak and x+l 02 Room Divider in cherry; the Tangāli Modular Armchair by Inoda + Sveje in cherry; and a dining table and bench by Markowitz in red oak. Wiles said the pieces reflected Phantom Hands’ commitment to craftsmanship and traditional manufacturing techniques, offering a sense of timelessness in an era of throwaway culture.
“Timber remains at the heart of our work, but this new chapter pushes the exploration beyond furniture,” said Aparna Rao, co-founder of Phantom Hands. “At its core, our collaboration with AHEC is an ongoing experiment, an attempt to understand what unfamiliar woods can do on their own terms and now to integrate them into the milieu of Indian furniture in an authentic way. It’s a learning curve, and the Design Mumbai pavilion became both its testing ground and its showcase — an ambitious, unexpected project that revealed how our relationship with wood and designing with it, is evolving.”
All images courtesy of Phantom Hands.
