Godrej Storwel

The Storwel is a steel almirah: a tall, freestanding cupboard of sheet steel, standing on short feet, closed by two flat doors that meet at a central handle and lock. Inside are shelves and, behind its own small door, a locker, for in an Indian household the almirah has long held not only clothes and linen but papers, cash and jewellery. The finish is a plain baked enamel, today in two greys, a brown and a blue.

It was made by Godrej & Boyce of Bombay, a firm founded in 1897 to make locks, at a time when factory locks were imported, and which went on to build India's first fire- and burglar-proof safes. In 1923, according to Business Today and Wikipedia, the company turned its steelwork to furniture, and its first piece was the Storwel cupboard. Nothing published describes that first cupboard in detail; Godrej's later advertising called the Storwel the first steel wardrobe in the country.

The advertisements show what it became. One offers a model wider and deeper than 'the standard Storwel', with adjustable shelves, concealed hinges, a channel-grip locker and a bolt that locked the door at top and bottom. Another shows a young man beside the cupboard and the line 'My son is 25 years old. So is my Godrej Storwel.' Sold under the promise that it lasts a lifetime, it was meant to be bought once and kept: the advertisement makes a cupboard as old as a grown son into its proof of quality.

The furniture works became Godrej Interio in 2006. The Storwel is still made: as the Storwel M2, a two-door steel almirah with a single locker, sold from Interio's own website for a little over thirty thousand rupees. Its handle and lock have been redrawn, but it is still a steel cupboard, locked from the front, holding what a household keeps safe.