Irshad Ahmad Ansari Handicrafts

We are based out of Pul Banjaran near the Seopuri Mandi. It’s a place that’s always full of movement and noise from the market nearby. My family has been doing handicrafts for a long time, and I just grew up into it. We work out of a modest space where you’ll always find someone busy with their hands. There is no big factory line here. Everything is done at a human pace. We have various tools and raw materials scattered around the workshop, and sometimes it looks like a bit of a mess to an outsider. But we know exactly where everything is. The air usually smells of wood and polish. When the Mandi is in full swing, it can be hard to hear yourself think with all the shouting and the carts going by, but you get used to it after a while. We don't have a showroom with fancy glass cases. If you want to see what we make, you just come in and look at what’s currently on the benches. It’s practical work and it takes a lot of patience. Sometimes a piece takes days to get right, and we don't rush it. We are just local people making things the way we were taught. It’s not about being the biggest business in the area, just about doing the work we know how to do and keeping the tradition going in our own small way.