I’m Swathi
Welcome to my personal website, where I share my stories of cultural identity, creative inspiration, and the daily love affair I have with my home, family, children, style, food... The list goes on, but I’d rather you read my stories and discover them yourself. I love storytelling - be it through words, design, or fashion. I believe that we all have stories to share, some that take longer to uncover, remember, or accept. I know that it’s been a lifelong process for me, and now I’m excited to share my passions and preoccupations with you. If you’d like to learn more about my personal and professional background, you can continue reading below. But for now, I hope you feel at home on these pages, the same way I’d love you to feel if you dropped by our house for food and a chat and more snacks and music and laughter and maybe a few tears. I hope we can discover that sense of home together — what it means to us now, what it meant to us in the past. So we can be comfortable in knowing where we belong, what space we wish to occupy, and how we hope to share it with others. So we can all feel at home in the world.
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Swathi draws upon a varied and rich body of artistic influence in her creative work. Trained in Indian classical dance, piano, and painting, she grew up in a household filled with music, visiting artists from India, and an array of textile and heirlooms. With a lifelong love of the written word, her poetry and fiction has been published in independent literary journals.
With a 25-year career in diplomacy and international affairs, Swathi has lived in Washington, Boston, London, Paris, Geneva, and New Delhi, with travel and work in over 20 countries. She honed her ability to seek out galleries and artists in each new place, collecting and curating art and a network of sources along the way. Multiple moves also provided multiple homes as fresh canvases to design for the unique lifestyle, entertaining needs, and cultural context offered by different cities. A seasoned and professional negotiator, representative, and communicator, she is well placed to understand the nuances of clients’ needs and to develop creative and unique ways to get things done efficiently, effectively, and enjoyably.
Swathi has had a longstanding passion for interior design and art. She could be found rearranging furniture, rugs and artifacts in her parents’ turn of the century home from a young age. Much of her youth was spent restoring the historic family home alongside her engineer father, giving her a hands-on education and foundation in understanding building and renovation. Many school holidays were spent in India exploring the architecture of ancient temples, visiting warehouses of antiques, and sourcing textile to design clothing.
Swathi founded Studio Kahaani, offering interior design and bespoke creative services, to share the knowledge and experience she has amassed, and to advocate for a culturally informed approach to design and home life. Studio Kahaani’s ethos of diversity, originality, and functionality is a culmination of all these influences.
She applied these principles to a two-year process of renovating a historic Victorian home in Ottawa, where she now lives with her husband and two children (and happens to be next door to her childhood home). The interior design of their family home is a reflection of the modern, organic, warm, timeless, and collected approach that are hallmarks of Swathi’s aesthetic.
Curated for You
