Eco friendly - Gem Stone Doors

An alternate to wood and related products for making doors, partitions, murals and more. Quartz stone inlaid with semiprecious stones, metals and crystals.

Premium furniture from hard wood trees like rosewood and teak contribute to more than half of the total luxury furniture products. These trees contribute a great deal to the forest cover in the tropical and evergreen forests. Hectares of essential forest cover are destroyed to feed the furniture industry that thrives on the customer demand for wood and related products. Although there are current substitutes for wood, conventional alternatives used in our interiors today focus on being low cost products that resemble natural materials like wood. For example, laminates, high and medium density fiber boards are used as an alternative to expensive natural wood like teak or rosewood. With these, there is no drastic visual change from natural wood and the customers craving for natural wood is still alive, end result being a partially satisfied consumer settling for a similar looking alternative to real wood.

Actila has addressed all these issues and needs of the consumers through the patented Flexi-Lite material engineered to provide a workable, viable and robust material for the furniture industry. With shrinking living spaces and smaller homes, furniture that can double as functional yet decorative elements while staying visually detached from wood is what Actila aims to provide.

"We choose to make the difference, in our drive to develop a material as a substitute for wood in the furniture industry, we have deliberately made an attempt to stay visually different from wood while retaining its workability and functionalities. Getting the consumer to defocus from the perceived beauty of wood is our main motto, only then can we restrict/reduce the consumption of forest wood in other applications as well." - Gosakan Aravamudan, Director and CEO.

For the first time in the world, Actila, a material science firm based in Bangalore, offers precious gem and reflective metal inlaid stone quartz doors and furniture. The flexi-Lite composite is an aesthetically pleasing, customizable medium with decorative elements made from metal, semi precious stones and crystals used to provide an elegant and rich surface. A variety of textures and surface finishes are possible to suit the visual and functional requirements of the application.

The quartz surface is inlaid with garnets, rubies, amethysts, sapphires, agates and other gemstones to seamlessly blend with the designs and concepts. Silver, brass and copper are aesthetically used as borders and elements. The stunning aspect about the product is its relatively light weight and flexible property for a material that is made from quartz stone; a huge advantage compared to natural stone slabs that would crack under impact. The light and flexible material is a durable, tested and aesthetically pleasing medium that may be used in a variety of application ranging from doors, tables, counter tops and wall partitions.

"Our Flexi-Lite doors are of "zero maintenance". With a metal grid incorporated within, they are much more secure than wooden doors. Our material is expansion, stain, scratch, water, fire and impact resistant. It can be easily cut and sized on site to exact frame requirements." - Product Development Team, Actila.

The doors can be easily installed on site, and require no special hardware. Durable hinges and pivots provide long term easy use of the doors. In-house technicians are available on call should the client require any assistance.

With conventional materials like wood, a customized design requires anywhere between 4 to 6 weeks to deliver an intricately carved or embellished piece of furniture such as a door. Actila's patented technology and manufacturing process ensures the customer of a quick delivery time of 10 days for a completely customized requirement.

Actila has a fully equipped manufacturing facility at Bidadi Industrial Area, Mysore Road, Bangalore employing a trained team of managers, specialist engineers, and supervisors. The large state-of-the-art manufacturing facility ensures that a highly intricate, design intensive piece of furniture can be made from scratch to finish as per requirements in 10 days.

In its endeavor to reduce the consumption of wood and forest products, Actila redefines the usage of semi precious stones and quartz to introduce to the world a whole new range of luxury furniture and interior products.

Mr. Gosakan Aravamudan, Director, Actila can be reached at gosakan@actila.com For further information, email enquiries@actila.com, or call Santosh Ravindranath, Business Manager at 9845510062.

Issue BG99 June06