Rickson Fernandes has been crafting wooden beauties through his venture The Rickstore
CHRISTINE MACHADO NT BUZZ
As a child, Rickson Fernandes used to watch in fascination as his grandfather created beautiful objects out of rough pieces of wood. “He would also let me use his tools under his watchful eye,” he recalls. This slowly grew into a passion for creating things. Fernandes began with cardboard before moving to wires, metals, and now wood. “I love creating new things. If I have a design in mind I’m at peace only when the ideas come to life,” he shares.
While for a long time Fernandes would create decor items for his family, friends and also his parish, it was a casual conversation with his friends and wife that prompted him to take this craft up seriously and The Rickstore was born towards the end of 2020.
Today, Fernandes, who operates out of Old Goa, creates various wooden products like planters, wedding decor items, customised wooden boxes, charcuterie boards, wooden earring stands, wooden trays, reclaimed wood trophies and medals, and laser engraving.
“I’m a huge believer in working with the environment and my work tries to incorporate measures of sustainability wherever possible from using recycled/reclaimed wood that is hand-picked by me, to driftwood finds that are naturally shaped by Goa’s beautiful coast,” he shares. For custom pieces, he works with his clients to pick wood of their preference from local sawmills.
So far, his most memorable order was creating hexagon wooden shaped planters as takeaways for his own wedding that was done in association with another home-grown brand, Plantisserie.
“In the midst of all the hustle that goes into a wedding, spending sleepless nights making more than 250 pieces was challenging and fulfilling. As a craftsperson, you tend to be very critical of your work and are never satisfied. So this journey of making the wedding planters was a humbling experience,” he shares.
But his venture is not without its challenges. “Balancing my full time job as service advisor and my commitments towards Rickstore is not always easy. Also, maintaining an online presence has been difficult, especially keeping up with the trends of social media for advertising,” he says. But his passion for creating something new and challenging keeps him going. “My love for making things out of wood is a major booster,” he says.
He has also had some key learning along the way. “The most difficult person to please is one’s own self and sometimes things don’t always go your way. So I have learned to take it easy sometimes,” he says. He has also understood the importance of collaborations with like-minded people and people who love what they do as it inspires him to refine his own ideas.
Going forward, Fernandes would like to experiment with creating something new by integrating wood with other complimenting materials. “I would also like to combine 3D printing with wood to make functional pieces,” he says. He also wants to expand this business to a larger scale operation in the future and make Rickstore a physical store.
