Kanya Neon Signs

Kanya Neon Signs is tucked away at number 7 Gandhi Nivas on Mettu Street in Ayanavaram. We are pretty close to the Adarsh Palace Hotel on Kalbadevi Road, so people usually use that as a landmark to find us. Making neon signs is a bit of a lost art, or at least it feels that way sometimes. Our shop is full of glass tubes, transformers, and bits of wire. It’s not the cleanest place in the world, but it’s where the work happens. We spend a lot of time bending glass and testing gas levels to get the colors right. It’s finicky work that takes patience. Some days the glass breaks and you have to start all over again, which is frustrating but part of the job. Mettu Street is always crowded, so getting supplies delivered can be a bit of a gamble with the traffic. We don't have a fancy showroom. Instead, we have half-finished signs leaning against the walls and tools scattered across the benches. The lighting in here is always a bit strange because of all the different colored signs we’re testing. We’ve been here in Ayanavaram for years, and the locals know the glow from our windows at night. It’s just a small team of us who actually enjoy the smell of hot glass and the hum of the electricity. We don't have a big corporate plan, we just want to finish the current sign so we can start the next one. Maybe tomorrow we will reorganize the back shelf, but usually we just keep on building.