Born in Bangalore in 1976, Sohail Rekhi is now forty-eight and still refuses to be boxed into a single label. Entrepreneur, furniture designer, novelist, and proud son of Indian cinema legend Waheeda Rehman, he blends business sense with a love for art in a way few manage. His path shows how someone can honor a famous family while striking out on a distinct, purpose-driven road.
Early years among scripts and schoolbooks
Growing up, Sohail’s home overflowed with creative energy. His mother rehearsed lines for classic films like Guide while his father, the late actor Shashi Rekhi, offered gentle critiques. Yet the household also insisted on solid academics. After primary classes in Bangalore, Sohail attended Kodaikanal International School and later Bishop Cotton Boys’ School, two campuses known for rigorous coursework and sprawling hill-station views. Schoolmates recall a curious student who read Indian mythology one day and woodworking manuals the next.
University in Canada broadens the lens
Craving global exposure, Sohail enrolled at Innis College, University of Toronto, earning a Bachelor of Arts in the late 1990s. Toronto’s multicultural atmosphere changed his outlook. He met classmates from Kenya, Peru, and South Korea, sparking conversations about sustainable design and fair trade. Those evenings in campus cafés planted the seeds for the venture he would launch nearly two decades later.
Founding Sadaya Guild: design with a conscience
Back in India, Sohail spent several years experimenting with small retail projects before his “light-bulb moment” in 2014. A visit to an old Mysuru bungalow being demolished revealed piles of discarded teak beams. He bought the lot, convinced the wood still had a story to tell. By July 2015 he had opened Sadaya Guild, a studio dedicated to high-end furniture built only from reclaimed timber.
Every Sadaya piece starts with sourcing. Teams comb through razed estates, shipping yards, and unused railway sleepers. Once the wood arrives, artisans hand-plane, treat, and craft it into statement tables, armoires, and headboards. Grains and nail scars remain visible, celebrating the timber’s past life. Customers receive a small card noting where their wood was salvaged—perhaps an 1890s Chettinad doorway or a decommissioned tea warehouse in Coonoor. This narrative approach has turned Sadaya into a cult brand among architects who crave eco-luxury without greenwashing.
Sohail insists that reclaimed doesn’t mean rustic. “True sustainability must feel aspirational,” he told a design journal last year. His best-selling Varuna Dining Table pairs century-old rosewood with sleek brass legs, showing how heritage and modern lines can coexist. The company’s workshop in Bengaluru now employs forty carpenters and polishers, offering steady wages and training in advanced joinery. Annual production is intentionally capped to preserve craftsmanship and reduce waste.
Writing “Angria” and stepping onto the literary stage
Furniture did not silence Sohail’s urge to tell stories. Between factory visits he drafted Angria, a historical novel set in a fictional Konkan port during the Maratha era. The book explores merchant families grappling with colonial trade, echoing Sohail’s own fascination with commerce and culture. When Angria debuted at the Jaipur Literature Festival, critics praised its layered characters and atmospheric detail. Sales pushed the title onto regional bestseller lists, proving he could switch from chisels to chapters with ease.
Family ties and personal life
Sohail’s relationship with his mother remains close. Waheeda Rehman, now eighty-seven and fresh from receiving the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 2023, often visits the Sadaya workshop, offering tea to carpenters and reminiscing about film sets that used similar hardwood props. The family’s creative streak extends to Sohail’s sister, Kashvi Rekhi, a script supervisor known for her precise continuity notes on Bollywood shoots.
In October 2016 Sohail married Dechhen Pelden, a Bhutanese entrepreneur he met at a sustainability conference in Thimphu. Their ceremony in Paro blended Buddhist chants with classical Hindi melodies. Today the couple divide time between Bengaluru and Thimphu, raising their seven-year-old daughter Rinchen amid two rich cultural traditions. Dechhen runs a fair-trade textile cooperative, creating natural-dye scarves that sometimes appear as décor accents in Sadaya’s product shoots.
Guiding principles and industry impact
Three ideas drive Sohail’s choices:
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Resource respect – Only wood already in circulation enters his workshop, and offcuts become home accessories or fuel briquettes for local kilns.
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Skill revival – Sadaya partners with declining artisan clusters in Karnataka, reintroducing dovetail joints and hand-turned legs that mass production nearly erased.
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Transparent storytelling – Each piece carries a QR code linking to photos of the wood’s original structure, promoting accountability.
These values resonate with a new crop of Indian consumers who no longer equate luxury with excess. As climate awareness grows, Sadaya Guild’s waiting list has stretched to eight months, and interior magazines regularly showcase its pieces in eco resort lobbies from Goa to Udaipur.
Why his journey matters
Sohail Rekhi demonstrates that heritage can inform rather than dictate destiny. Instead of stepping onto a ready-made Bollywood set, he wrote his own script—one where sustainability, storytelling, and selective scale triumph over quick fame. For young entrepreneurs pondering purpose, his path offers a clear takeaway: choose depth over flash, substance over trend. That philosophy may be the most valuable heirloom the Rekhi family passes down.
