NOUVEAU LUXURY

If kitchen is the heart of the home, bathroom can be considered as one of its muscles. Neo Indians are writing their own style statement – they are focussing on styling their bathrooms as one of their favorite rooms

- SHWETA DESHMUKH

Bathroom, as a segment, had for long, been the most neglected part of the Indian homes. However, since the last few years there has been a significant shift in people’s thinking and approach towards it. They have started wanting their baths to be like what they see or experience in a hotel or an airport.

With rising purchasing power and travel, Indians have started seeing their bathrooms as a place of investment – and hence people make budgetary allocations for their bathrooms while constructing or renovating their homes.

Most of the developers in these Tier-I cities have various segments of projects – starting from affordable housing to aspirational to high end to ultra-luxury. And thus the selection of sanitary ware also differs for these segments.

Affordable housing is for the masses where the end customer is happy with the kind of basic amenities and hence they are neither too choosy nor do they worry for the brand value. But the aspirational and ultra-luxury segments constitute major share of the market. “These customers are aware about the different brands available and hence we have to strive best to offer best brands,” said an architect.

AN ORGANISED MARKET

There is no dearth to the features and specs for this choosy category of customers. They demand ultra-modern sanitary ware – jets with multi modes, sensors, remote controls, touch-free gadgets, smart sanitary ware with voice commands, thermostats, hot seats, self –closing seats, etc. People refrain from using brands used by their neighbours to ensure uniqueness of their bathrooms and hence developers’ perspective changes as they leave the choice of brands to such clients. Also most of the developers give an option of ‘bare shell’ to the customers so that they can select their sanitary ware as per their choice of specs and budget.