Now in its second edition, India Design ID plants itself firmly in the city’s calendar as a cultural happening that reaches beyond décor to touch architecture, craft, and contemporary design thinking. From 26–28 September 2025, Jio World Garden in Bandra Kurla Complex becomes the stage for a three-day exploration of form and material under the thematic banner of The Age of Design Syncretism. True to its name, the festival is designed as a place of crossings: between craft and commerce, heritage and modernity, domestic practice and international outlook. Alongside curated installations and immersive showcases of furniture, lighting, and lifestyle design, the ID Symposium emerges as the intellectual anchor — a series of conversations with designers, architects, and curators from across the globe. Among the highlights is “Textile Matters: Fostering Indo-French Collaborations”, a panel pairing Loïc Turpin of Mobilier national with Indian curator and textile scholar Mayank Mansingh Kaul, moderated by Amandine Roggeman. In many ways, this dialogue encapsulates the festival’s ethos: weaving together different histories of making, to create something new.
The focus on textiles is particularly resonant. India’s living traditions of weaving, embroidery, and dyeing remain among the most sophisticated craft ecosystems in the world, while France’s Mobilier national carries centuries of expertise through its Gobelins, Beauvais, and Savonnerie ateliers (once the preserve of royal commissions, now laboratories of heritage and contemporary innovation.) Recent restructuring in France, which brought Mobilier national together with Sèvres’ porcelain manufacture, signals a renewed emphasis on collaboration across materials and borders. For ID Mumbai, that translates into tangible cultural diplomacy. Textile works emerging from Indo-French collaborations are set to travel between Mumbai and Paris, with exhibitions staged at Mobilier National’s Parisian home later this year (more on this soon, as we are partnering for the launch of this special event.) Beyond showcasing tapestries and fabrics, these initiatives open avenues for artisans and designers to exchange techniques, experiment with materials, and expand creative vocabularies. But ID Mumbai is not only about the intellectual weight of heritage institutions. Its exhibition programme pulses with contemporary energy. Neo Deco, a curated display by Fair Director Misha Bains, reinterprets Art Deco motifs through the lens of contemporary objet d’art, a natural fit for a city whose architecture is steeped in Deco geometry. Meanwhile, Syncretic Threads offers immersive, textile-led installations, inviting visitors to walk through woven narratives and tactile landscapes.
