Driving along Old Mumbai Highway and Dargah Road, you’re bound to see colossal slabs of various stone arrayed in open warehouses- it’s as though you’ve entered some kind of giant town where you are merely minuscule intruders.
Wholesalers such as Archean, Om Marmo World and Silpa take up huge acres of space on one side of the highway, but for good reason. The interiors-conscious people of Hyderabad are now leaning into customising their homes and workspaces and who better to speak to than those who have an overwhelming supply of heritage stone?
Sirisha and her husband Dhruv walk through the practically endless rows of marble and granite, carefully selecting the ideal counter-top stone. The couple shares that they prefer to approach wholesalers directly to save on the expenses while also directly supporting them. “Seeing the actual stones rather than in a catalogue makes it more real for us,” says Sirisha.
You can tell that a lot of the wholesalers are run by close-knit groups of people. And while older parts of the city do have similar sellers, the likes of Gachibowli and Lanco Hills have attracted more branches of the original warehouses to draw in more crowds, be it businesses or individuals.
Satish, an employee at one of the wholesalers, explains there’s more to the business than just selling stone, adding, “We also offer crafting services. We do end up competing with other sellers here and it gets a bit crazy. But it’s fun.”
The expertise of employees like Satish who know the facts and specs of every stone and how it behaves under any manipulation is what a lot of people end up paying lakhs for in education. He says it comes from years of practice and studying. “Now people want to see stones from other countries here and that does worry us, but our stone is good and we are confident about what we do,” he comments, adding “You can see people are here and are actually buying.”
For those with more fickle tastes in terms of stone, places in Gachibowli offers Italian marble complementing spaces of a warmer undertone, proving the city has always offered the best in stone for anyone who wanders into a store. For those with more ‘out there’ tastes, composites and quartzes are available but not in the same behemoth quantities as the former mentioned.
While a resident of the area, Aabha, has driven along the 13km stretch of road, she’s never walked into one, adding, “I’ve seen many generations of the same family run these places. It’s kind of a trust thing. It also looks very impressive because of that; it shows that families believe in these businesses and want to see them thrive.” If you walk in at certain times, you’ll also see children of the owners running around, wanting to help in any way they can. It is an endearing sight and also indicative of the intergenerational interest in the longevity of this type of stone market in Hyderabad.