Our Capitol Collection accurately and respectfully revives the Chandigarh Capitol Complex designs. Each piece is handcrafted by our master artisans using the same traditional techniques and materials as the original mid century designs. We use exclusively teak wood and natural handwoven rattan. We made slight tweaks to the designs to meet your modern needs.
The TreeHause ethos aligns with the Chandigarh furniture designs of Pierre Jeanneret. We collaborate with artisan partners using locally available natural materials. Each piece is handcrafted with solid teak and handwoven with natural rattan true to the original materials and craftsmanship. Our editions respectfully revive his story and designs.
Our journey to preserve hand craft led us to Jeanneret’s design story. We extensively researched his approach and the blueprints of the Chandigarh Capitol Complex.
Just as Jeanneret designed his collection for his users, we tweaked the designs for your modern lifestyle.
We, like Jeanneret, use only teak because of its premium quality, elegance, and durability. Many brands offer “teak finish” and substitute the teak for an inferior, lower cost wood. Newer editions often use modern machines in place of the human hand.
Our carpenters handcraft each piece, precisely cutting and assembling with joinery. We hand sand and stain to perfection.
Many contemporary versions compromise the aesthetics with machine woven rattan mats, characterized by their diamond shape, stapled into the frame.
TreeHause takes a different approach. We hand weave every piece using natural rattan made from tropical palms. Our rattan is intricately woven into the frame by masters weavers in a square webbing pattern, true to their artisanal techniques.
The distinct pattern and unique beauty of the handwoven is unmatched.
You are unique, and your home should be a reflection of that. Your home deserves designs with a soul and a story. Just as no two trees are the same, neither are the hands that create each piece.
To represent this uniqueness we hand label each piece with a brass plate symbolizing the journey from the Tree to your Hause.
After gaining independence from England in 1947, India’s new government set out to become a modern democracy and wanted a way to show the world. In 1951, they commissioned the father of Modern Architecture, renowned French architect Le Corbusier, to create a masterplan for a new modernistic city that would become the capital of the Punjab state. This city was named Chandigarh.
In 1951, Jeanneret moved to India where he would live for 15 years. He embraced the local culture and craft integrating traditional materials and techniques into the fabrication of his designs. His designs harmonized form and function all while emphasizing practicality. Locally available teak and rattan along with traditional craftsmanship methodologies allowed for these now modern icons to be simply and affordably produced.
The furniture designs were given out to local carpentry workshops with instructions that they could improvise on the design at their discretion. As a result, there are many variations of each piece.
By the 1980s, the people of Chandigarh grew tired of Jeanneret’s familiar furniture and began replacing them with more modern, mass-produced tables and chairs. These original pieces began piling up in junkyards and were even sold for firewood.
This caught the attention of a French furniture collector who started purchasing these pieces in 1999. Over the next decade, the passion for mid-century modernism grew, and with that so did the market for Chandigarh furniture—more of Jeanneret’s surviving furniture was snapped up by international collectors. This did not go unnoticed. In 2011, India’s government prohibited any further removal of Jeanneret's furniture from Chandigarh.
Jeanneret's pieces have since become increasingly rare, and therefore more desirable. In recent years, auction houses have auctioned off Jeanneret’s furniture for astronomical prices, each piece fetching tens of thousands of dollars.
Even with its increased popularity, the definition of an original Pierre Jeanneret piece is still up for debate as there is no design license or official manufacturer. Hundreds of studios and artisans were responsible for the multiple variations of the Chandigarh Capitol Complex furniture pieces.
Jeanneret’s designs produced today are often called re-editions. At TreeHause we want to bring affordability back to these designs. Our re-editions are made using the same techniques and materials used by Pierre Jeanneret and his team.
To honor his story and unique design approach, TreeHause named our inaugural collection the Capitol Collection. Like Jeanneret, we live and work in the communities of our artisans. Our design process took several months and multiple samples to get just right. We can't wait for you to experience our rendition of these icons.
