Kiss Ass

The prospect of taking an oversized pair of red hot lips home is always enticing, but not if you have to pay lakhs of rupees for a pucker. At Poltrona Frau Group Design Center, a plush new home store in Kala Ghoda, Dali-inspired lip couches and other cool pieces of furniture can be ordered, but they’ll cost you an arm and a leg. Quite a body of work!

To Suit Your Case

The three storey Poltrona Frau joins the league of overpriced, fancy furniture stores in Mumbai where browsing is fun, but buying isn’t. Here we spotted a dry bar that pops out of a giant suitcase and can be carried anywhere (Rs 5 lakhs); a knotted carbon strand chair that can take 200 kgs of weight, and which you can lift with your little finger (Rs 1 .35 lakhs); and a colourful bar stool that looks like a kiddie high chair from the ‘60s (price on request). Pretty as they might be, none of these can qualify as impulse buys, not just due to their hefty price tag but also because all pieces have to be ordered, and will arrive at your doorstep 12 weeks later, freshly manufactured in Italy.

More Legs

A walk around the store also reveals a bunch of other concept chairs – psychedelic thrones, garden cane sofas and plush leather recliners. The line of office furniture, however, is entirely forgettable as are the side tables and decorative bric-a-brac.

Would we return to this store? Not really. Once was fun, but it’s hard to put our money where their (giant) mouth is.

Mozaic: Bits and Pieces

If you can’t score these  glorious Italian heroes, comfort yourself with the often interesting supporting cast of desi goods over at Mozaic, another new lifestyle store that popped up in Bandra over the weekend. Like so many establishments in the suburb, this one retails out of a pretty bungalow. The proprietors hope that the space becomes one where everyone from interior professionals to individual customers come to play house. Mozaic stocks heavy furniture, random art pieces and other decorative pieces, and also provides design consulting and registry services (it’s one of the few places in the city to do so).

Give Piece a Chance

Every room in this cottage is styled differently; in the ground floor the art/sculpture chamber live four glass busts, a five-feet tall empty frame looking for a mirror, upside down vases that look like flames. These are fun to check out, but nothing we’d go home with. The other rooms fare better, with a cheery cherry red rocking chair, a super cute lounging hippo artefact (Rs 1,000), and adorable newspaper print pillows (Rs 1,100)  that make for a good lay.

Getting there: Poltrona Frau Group Design Center, ITTS House, K Dubash Marg, Kala Ghoda, call 66153334, log on to www.poltronafraugroup.in; Mozaic, Victory Villa, next to Bank of India, Turner Road, Bandra (W), call 9820194985.