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The 44-year-old Rajeev Wind creates Zen in everything he creates with bamboo. The design is simple and measurable, materials are never wasted, and the final product is always useful. "We don't want to make things we don't need or waste what nature has given us," said Wind, who is recognized as one of the masters of bamboo craftsmanship in India.

He grew up in the mountains of Idukki, Kerala. When his parents were farming, he watched his grandmother weave bamboo baskets for a living. He studied for a diploma in telecommunications at a polytechnic in Malappuram, but could not find a job. "At that time I started using natural fibers to make a living," he said. "Bamboo is given because in Idukki, it is abundant; the forest is full of it." Today, he describes the reed, the bamboo he works with, is magical.

He started making wind chimes in the early 2000s. "Growing up in Idukki, I would watch the Periyar River go through the forest," Wind said. "I want to reproduce the beauty of nature through sound, so I chose to make wind chimes." He needs 10 days to fine-tune one to produce the sound of the tropics, forests, streams, rivers or mountains. "Without nuts and bolts, there are very few fixations and adjustments," he said. This is almost a process of finding form. "This is to let bamboo do what it wants to do; let nature take its course."

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Wende taught himself to play the Tongari or the nose flute, and regarded himself as a craftsman and artist. "I have the skills to use bamboo," he said. "But I also have a creative curiosity. Over the years I have conducted more experiments with this material." Since 2019, he has started to mix it with other materials (such as metal) for installations and sculptures. Get a more modern, longer-lasting appearance.

His work has not been overlooked: since March 2019, the Beijing-based International Organization of Bamboo and Rattan (Inbar) has mentioned it three times, and this may be the first time Inbar has named an individual Indian craftsman. He is now invited by Yingba to engage in bamboo and plastic packaging.

Does the wind in his name come from wind chimes? "A little bit," he said. "We are all working hard for breathing and air. Every breath is new but historically significant. So I decided to use Wind in my name."

Meeting with Sushanth C. Sathyendran in 2001, he led the National Institute of Design (NID) Bamboo Project Center, which made him think about more than wind chimes. "At that time I began to realize that not only can I make wind chimes, but there are endless other possibilities with this fiber," he said. "I found that bamboo is very unique, and people always want things made with it."

Bamboo can grow 1 million meters a day and is becoming more and more popular as a sustainable material. But for Wind, this is also related to conscious consumption. "Everything I design and make must be useful. Otherwise, getting things from nature is futile," he said. So there is an amplifier that does not require charging; complicated lamps and lampshades; delicate and practical fruit trays; even bracelets, earrings and necklaces.

Wind, usually works alone, only builds a team for big projects, retails on social media, mainly Instagram and Facebook. Products range from 50 rupees (e.g. paper clips) to 50,000 rupees or more, depending on the design and size. The best sellers are decorations; most of his clients are people who are interested in bamboo or the concept of sustainable living.

"People in Kerala have been using bamboo for centuries," Wind said. "The tribe uses bamboo to build their homes. Fishing nets, mats, flutes, baskets-in this sense, it is not a new fiber at all." In fact, the first mention of bamboo in Kerala was in Morocco in the 14th century. In the work of traveler Ibn Battuta, he recorded the use of bamboo mats as sails on Chinese ships in Kozhikode (then Calicut).

The word bamboo is believed to come from Banwu, the word comes from southwestern India, probably in Kannada, and was brought to the forests of Indonesia by Dutch explorers. It first aroused the imagination of the West in the 16th century, when travelers in the Far East passed back a story of a magical plant, which the British called "a thick reed, as big as a human leg".

Kerala has 28 species of bamboo-essentially a kind of grass. Wind likes the reed bamboo found in Idukki. "It is strong, sustainable, and versatile. It is like steel, strong and highly renewable because it is rich in nature." It is very suitable for weaving.

"The beauty of bamboo is its degradation," Wind said. "There is a season to collect it; a way to collect and store it." There is no doubt that master craftsmen have their own methods of processing and seasoning bamboo to make it usable and protect it from insects.

When it was in what he called the "smile" stage, he collected it from the forest. "This is when Bamboo decides to say goodbye to life," he said. The reed reaches this point when it matures and turns dark red; this takes two to three years. "This shows that biologically speaking, there is no life in bamboo, and now is the time to collect it," he said. The bamboo was then stored at room temperature for one year. "At room temperature, it will be processed with the weather and stored naturally," he said. After this operation is completed, it is ready to use.

Wind has a government permit to purchase bamboo directly from the forest. "So I choose my own raw materials and always remember to only take what I need," he said. If he needs younger bamboo, he will buy it from the Kerala Bamboo Industry Company.

Recently, Wind's work has attracted the attention of architects and engineers. He began to seek cooperation with universities in Kerala and even hosted seminars at NID in Bangalore. "Usually, we think that our lives are completely independent of the environment," Wind said. "I think it's time to find a way of life that blends perfectly with nature."

Anubha George, who lives in Kochi, writes articles about culture.

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