Architect turned industrialist Nindya Bucktowar on betting on herself and building a business ecosystem from scratch.
Katlego Sekhu
Multidisciplinary artist, architect, businesswoman and lecturer Nindya Bucktowar joined DJ Fresh and Thato Mataboge on the Big Moves segment of Kaya Breakfast, the space where the show spotlights people building businesses worth paying attention to.
Nindya arrived in South Africa from Mauritius at eighteen to study architecture, and spent six years designing industrial buildings in Durban before she walked away from a stable career to build her own.
Freedom is what drove that decision. “The one thing that is very strong for me is my freedom, and that comes with financial freedom, freedom of how you use your time and what you do,” she says.
Working nine to five inside someone else’s practice was never going to be her whole career. It became a stepping stone instead. “It was always the plan to diversify and to build an empire, if you can call it that,” Nindya explains.
Alongside her partner Nikhil, Nindya now runs four entities under one roof: Kalki Ceramics, a factory producing high end ceramic surfaces, Studio Kalki, a design house spanning architecture, interiors and furniture, her personal art practice Nindya Ceramics, and a leather studio. Rather than competing for her attention, she sees them as one living system. “I don’t see them as separate entities. It’s like what I want to manifest, like my authenticity, and they all live in the different projects that we manage,” she says.
That mindset, Nindya believes, comes from her architecture training as much as anything else. “You don’t know enough about business to be scared to fail, but then you’re crazy enough to say I can fix anything,” she laughs.
Balancing a manufacturing business with a deeply personal art practice sounds like a contradiction, but for Nindya the two feed each other. Making art is what keeps her able to run everything else. As she puts it, “balance is a myth, because you can never truly be in balance. It’s always oscillating between what’s more important.”
Her list of accolades includes the Nando’s Hot Young Designer award in 2021, RMB’s Talent Unlocked, and a shortlist for the ANNA Award, alongside exhibitions in South Africa and France. Kalki Ceramics is five years old, Studio Kalki three, and each recognition has opened doors, provided she was ready to walk through them.
For anyone still sitting in corporate and dreaming of their own thing, Nindya’s advice was simple.
“Don’t be scared to do it. You have one life, every day counts,” she says. “Be where you want to be, be with people you want to be, do what you want to do and what feeds your soul.”
To hear the full conversation, listen to the podcast.
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