"Old is Gold" is a much familiar proverb which means that old things are always not waste and they should be valued. There is a lot of stuff in our homes which is old and most of which is out of condition, so one wonders, how can it be valued like gold? Well, my article today is about recycling old stuff and using it to add aesthetic value to your home.
Many of us in India are fortunate enough to receive old wooden, hand-me-down furniture, some would question my sanity, but yes, they are fortunate. Because in spite of being old fashioned in design, that old furniture is very beautiful and the wood is extremely sturdy and cured, barring of course, some pieces that may have not been looked after well and/or may have fallen victim to termite attack. The furniture in olden days used to be made of solid wood such as ebony, sheesham (rosewood), teak etc.that added a lot of character to the furniture. During those days, strict rules were followed so only the wood from well matured trees was used which made the wood sturdy, durable and disease resistant. Unlike today when furniture is mostly made from plywoods, MDF boards and untreated wood, although they look beautiful, they are not really long lasting that essential character of olden times is missing from them.
Although I must say that the furniture that is being produced now is more minimalistic and simplistic in design and consideration for reduced spaces in homes is taken into account unlike the old furniture which is usually hefty and of voluminous proportions. Also, wooden furniture needs delicate care and occasional coat of polish and other treatments which is not a task that many people look forward to owing to time constraints. So many people now prefer to dispose off the old furniture and replace it with readymade stuff that does not need any special cleaning requirements other than occasional dusting and vacuuming.
But nowadays the trend is again changing. People who have larger spaces and money to indulge are now trying to create unique looks for their homes. So they are now buying more of old stuff and restoring them to use in their homes. There are many people who when building their homes are scouring flea markets in cities across India and other countries looking for beautiful old pieces of furniture for furnishing their homes. In Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Gujarat, the heavy, metal-embellished doors and windows of hundreds of esrtwhile wadas and havelis have similarly found their way into a number of bungalows built by discerning people who wanted their homes to have a strong character and to revive the nostalgia of olden days.
In Pune, there were hundreds of old wadas which were demolished to give way to high-rise buildings and apartment complexes in the course of development of Pune as a metro city. Unfortunately, it took a long time for many to realize the lost value of the treasures that these old wadas held. Until then, nothing was done to conserve the old structures and various wooden pillars, beams, lattices, window and door frames etc. But some did wake up and brought these into their homes and many have now created a wada inside their modern homes, thus keeping a piece of history alive in their homes. A fine example that can be publicly seen is the famous Mastani Mahal that has been recreated in the Kelkar Museum in Pune, (Mastani was the consort of the Peshwa Bajirao I (1699-1740), the valiant general and prime minister of the Maratha empire)
What you can do?
When renovating your home or building a new home, you can decide a theme around which you can build the look of your house. You can decide to create your home in ethnic looks, you can buy artifacts and furnishings with ethnic design and print and work around that. The old refurbished furniture will hold the look together well. The curtains that you get made should be in bright, rich colours such as reds, golds and browns to complement the theme. Once you start, you will get many ideas with which you can retain the old stuff and create unique, individualistic look for your home rather than disposing them off at dirt-cheap prices.
Below are some ideas which can be used in your homes too:
Recycling and Restoring Old Furniture
All of us may not have access to fine pieces of the olden days nor have the financial resources to buy such fine stuff. But what we can do is restore and 
refurbish what we have. For example, when we renovate our home, instead of replacing the furniture we already have, we can simply polish the furniture, maybe in a different colour and texture and replace the upholstery to match the new colour scheme of the walls and to match the patterns of the curtains. If the wood is very old, you can get a local carpenter to treat the wood to make it more durable and save it from future termite infestations. This will increase the longevity of the furniture and also improve the appearance, not to forget the added incentive of it being a more economical means to add new look to our home. If a particular wooden cupboard or cabinet is too heavy and cumbersome, you can may be take it apart and make two or three smaller pieces from it keeping the original design intact. A big cupboard can be turned into two book cases or a book case and a shelf to hold your fine china maybe. Depending on the dimensions of that particular furniture, you can decide what you want to do with it.
If you have old chairs with broken legs, you can level out the legs on all chairs and create a low seating arrangement. Polish them in a darker colour such as mahogany or ebony shades and they will make your living room look really beautiful. If the chairs are upholsetered, change the fabric to a rich brown and gold hues or red and gold hues and make your living room look like a royal retreat. Complement the look with same coloured curtains for doors and windows and place antique showpieces around so the overall look holds together well.
Old tables should be treated with polish and the legs could be cut off and leveled as a low-seating dining table. Instead of chairs, you could use jute or chatai single-seat mats or thin cushions covered with red, gold and brown-toned fabric.
You can procure old brass knockers, cabinet and door handles etc. from local flea markets for your doors, cupboards and cabinets to complement the ethnic look. Juna Bazaar in Pune and the famous Chor Bazaar in Mumbai are quite well known places to find such virtual treasures. Almost all big cities have one such market, you only need to find time to scour these places and own a discerning eye to recognize such treasures!
Recycling Old Utensils
Traditionally Indian homes used to be inhabited by fairly large joint families necessitating use of large number of huge utensils made from brass, copper and bronze. But now with nuclearization of large families to tiny families with just 3 or 4 members and lack of large spaces has proved the task of maintaining such utensils a difficult task. By all means dispose off what you are never going to use, but retain at least a few pieces for posterity. The future generations should know what kind of treasures belonged to their family. Instead of using up precious storage space, use these utensils and containers instead so that they do not simply gather dust. You can use them to store food grains instead of the lacklustre plastic containers. Old brass, copper and bronze handas and kalsis (water containers) can be polished to a shine and stacked up together to create interesting displays. While putting them on display, you can also use them to stow away small knick knacks so that the space instead them is put to use.
Copper and brass urlis can be brought out during special occasions and festivals, polished nicely and filled with water, float a few marigolds and some lovely diyas and it is sure to become a conversation piece for the entire evening. During summer months, these urlis can be placed close to a fan or a cooler, filled with water and a few mogra flowers, it will make your house turn cool and fragrant. Some of the really bigger ones that eat up a lot of space inside can be placed outside in the balcony, at the entrance or in the garden, just place a pot of some beautiful foliage plants in each of these vessels and see the transformation that takes place. You can group together a few assorted vessels of different shapes and sizes to create an interesting display of plants in these special planters.
Other pots, pans, spoons, ladles etc. can be cleaned off of their grime and hung up on walls to create interesting displays. Similarly, old hand tools can also create interesting and unique displays, much better than plastic showpieces that attract dust!
Recycling Old Fabrics
Old Banarasi and other silk sarees with zari borders, sarees that are too worn for use, can be used to make bright and beautiful cushion covers. Such old worn out fabrics can be salvaged to create a number of things. Tear out the sarees and dupattas and use larger pieces of the fabric to create window dressings and if possible, curtains for the doors. They will complement the overall ethnic look of your home. These pieces of fabric The zari borders can be used to make tiebacks for your curtains, or they can even be sewn on the edges of straw chatais, place mats and runners on your dining table. That will give your guests something to talk about. Most traditional silk sarees like Banarasis, Paithanis, Kanjeevarams etc. have extremely beautiful and intricately woven pallus. These pallus can be simply cut out properly and framed to create a breathtakingly beautiful piece to adorn your walls. If you have more than one such sarees, you can make an assorted variety of cushion covers to adorn your sofas for festivals and special occasions.
Other ways to use these heirloom fabrics is to make beautiful scarves to go with your evening ensembles. You can also use some of the tougher and thicker fabrics to make handbags or batuas (drawstring bags) and embelllish them with rhinestones and pearls. You can even sew small squares or different fabrics interspersed with zari pieces between them to make an interesting throw rug or a quilt.
Antiques and Artifacts
Instead of buying antique pieces from specialty showrooms that cost a fortune, you can display old brass and bronze artifacts as pieces of art around your home. Old traditional paan (betelnut) boxes made of brass and bronze with intricate, beautiful designs can be displayed at strategic locations. These can be accompanied by intricately made, beautiful adkittas (nutcrackers). Old bronze statuettes of various dieties can be similarly displayed in especially created corners and niches in your living room. Old surahis and samovars (water pitchers), coffee pots etc. can be displayed in corners, side tables etc or displayed as the focal point of your decor. Old glass handis can be hung from the ceilings in lieu of expensive crystal chandeliers.
Collecting Such Antiques and Artifacts as a Hobby
There are many people who have acquired the hobby of collecting such old things. A couple of years ago, we happened to visit an exhibition in Pune held by a gentleman who has acquired beautiful old lamps, and diyas over some decades. He had put up his entire collection which contained lamps that were hundreds of years old and also from many countries. His hobby thus has helped save a piece of history from each particular era and country, that lamp was manufactured in and all of them held a key to their glorious pasts. The exhibition was held in the evening and each lamp was lit up, a beautiful and touching scene, one that can not be forgotten soon. One of my friends and her husband have a hobby of collecting old swords and I got to see an original ninja sword!
Similarly, one can use the heirloom artifacts one has acquired and start a collection of their own. Such a collection is not just beautiful, but it can be priceless and extremely valuable too.
Old rare books are another thing that one need not know throw off in raddi! Books are the written testimonials of our culture and civilization and the rarer they are, the better. In fact some extremely rare book collection can be very priceless too. So why dispose off something like that, display them well in your living room and earn the envy of your neighbours!
To conclude, there are just so many ways in which you can put the old stuff in your homes to good use and create a unique, original look for your home that is much more pleasingly aesthetic and individualistic over the readymade stuff you can buy. So before you reach for something to throw away, stop and think twice! You may very well find a much better use for it in your own home.