Chapter 8

It was the evening of the following Sunday. Anjali and Panya were sitting around the table in their cluttered consulting room. The streets of the town were nearly deserted, and a Sunday silence filled the empty shop. Panya was there waiting when Anjali returned.

‘Panya will be there waiting,’ thought Anjali as she struggled through the backdoor of the building.

‘I wanted to hear how it all went,’ said Panya. ‘You have worked hard for this, and we should not let these moments pass us by.’

Anjali laid her work files on the back table with the same care she would have laid down one of the four Vedas. She took a seat at the table, which was still covered with the evidence of last-minute adjustments.

‘The room where we met the Danish Chairman,’ Anjali said with some fatigue lining her face, ‘was a panelled office sitting in one corner of the factory so that its windows looked down into the town in two directions.’

She paused for a moment and then seemed to catch the correct thread.

‘I felt comfortable as soon as we entered. The design appeared simple, but that simplicity allowed the decorative elements - implicit to the layout of the furnishing - to shine through. This was not about simplicity; this was about clearing any distraction and allowing the core theme to communicate. It was not the negation of detail; it was a mechanism that focussed on the detail that mattered.

‘The power of design is about understanding the thought patterns of your audience and changing your approach, so that your communication targets those thought patterns. It is the action of the virus, adapting itself to the structures it must connect with. I could sense it, Panya. The cut and the fine embroidery of the factory manager's suit, and the way the symbols were carried through the materials that ornamented his presentation. I knew it would give the inevitability to the outcome the Factory Manager so needed.’

Anjali’s string of impressions became tangled, and she was silent until Panya asked, ‘This is also the ornamentation on your jacket?’

‘I was conscious that one cannot sit around such a table without being part of the act. The same cut and embroidery motive is reflected in this corded jacket. I only thought of that last night, and I was struggling to see the movement of the needle by the time I had the last stitch in place.

‘I was still more convinced that the approach was right, as we began to follow the formalities that were woven through the whole meeting. We sat around drinking sharp coffee from simple cups and everything on the table coordinated with them: the bottles of water on a carved wooden tray that ran down the centre: the table markers that indicated each person’s place. There were four pictures on the wall, each with an intensity of colour and form. If you visualise a picture carved out of ice, then imagine that these are the counterparts to that picture.

‘How was the presentation?’ asked Panya. ‘He does not communicate easily I think.’

‘It was not the Factory Manager who arrived at our counter a week ago who opened the presentation. It was someone with confidence, who knew that each word was sharpened and pushed through with that efficiency that flows from good design.

‘As he gestured the fabric of the garments captured the mood that was required. The Factory Manager created the words and responded to the questions; but alongside that was the stitched message of quiet capability - of a steady advance to a certain end.

‘Fashion was hard at work in the boardroom. The design embroidered the truth, but in a way that made the truth more credible rather than any distraction from that truth. The Chair nodded as he followed the thread of inevitability, stitched through every heading, picture and chart.

‘As the design soaked away his uncertainties, the nature of the Chair’s questions changed. The spotlight moved away from whether the Factory Manager’s plan could be accomplished and began to shine instead on how it might be implemented. The design was accepted - and now what mattered was how the finishing touches would be applied.

‘The meeting came towards its conclusion. There were a few ‘alterations-for-form’ that the Chair added like a stamp of Danish approval.

‘After a sprinkling of more formalities, the Factory Manager showed me out through the deserted offices. He handed me a cheque for the work I had done, saying that he would not want me to be out of pocket, and there was further work to be done before the presentation to the full board. I am to ring him at seven thirty tomorrow morning for his thoughts.

‘Well done, Anjali.’

Panya rose and squeezed Anjali's shoulders together. It was an action that Anjali would never have expected of Panya.

‘This is good work,’ she said.

Anjali, recovering, continued, ‘The next meeting will be more formal. I know that there are two people who will be presenting. I realise I need to dress them with a discreetly altered design.

‘The dress needs to speak of machine precision. The Danish directors need to feel the complete commitment to act in the interests of their authority. But I also want a reference to this valley and its history. The people who run this weaving mill know the ways of the valley. Whereas they can be relied upon to take in hand the change that is needed, they also have the unique strength of knowing those things that need to stay the same.’

Panya waited until she was sure that Anjali had finished. She did not want to interrupt Anjali’s moment of relieved reflection. Then she said, ‘I bought a small bottle of sparkling wine. I thought we should celebrate in the local way. It is a small token and a recognition of something of significance that we have achieved. I feel also that this is no time to tempt fate.’

‘Look at this cheque Panya,’ said Anjali, as her effervescent white wine leaped against the rim of its glass. ‘We earned more from this one presentation than we would earn in two weeks of repairs and alterations.’