In the Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (ICSE) system, there used to be a class I genuinely looked forward to—and, as you can tell from this page, rightfully aced!

It was Socially Useful Productive Work (SUPW).

(A place where all the Arts and Humanities students happily gathered.)

Bet most of my schoolmates didn’t even know what SUPW stood for! 🤣

Learning by Doing

SUPW was all about making things with your hands and learning along the way.

We learnt embroidery and knitting, gardening and cooking, painting and sketching, home science, electrical appliances, and all kinds of handmade projects.

There was something wonderfully tangible about it. You weren’t simply reading about how something worked—you were actually doing it.

You had to figure things out. Make mistakes. Try again. Work with other people. Finish something you could actually hold in your hands.

Looking back, I think SUPW quietly taught us something much bigger than the individual projects themselves: creative problem-solving, collaboration, patience and the confidence to learn by doing.

And, fun fact: I used to end up doing other students’ assignments—from high school all the way through design school.

(Shhh……)

SUPW Skills for Life

I can tell you that SUPW gives you the kind of life skills that put your mind at ease.

How do you sew a button back on?

How do you mend a broken tile?

How do you care for a plant?

How do you make something instead of simply buying it?

How do you look at a problem and think, “Hmm… I can probably figure this out.”

These may sound like small things, but they build a certain resourcefulness.

And perhaps that’s what stayed with me.

A Creative Life

The social sciences, arts, design, food and culture have always felt to me like different parts of the same creative ecosystem.

This blog—and my Instagram feed—is really a reflection of that.

Stories around food, design, culture, making and everyday creativity.

In my case, being a SUPW student for life hasn’t been such a bad thing. It has kept me sane through a pandemic, for one!

More importantly, it has given me a way to keep exploring, making and learning.

Over the past year, you’ve probably seen several projects, experiments and creative avatars emerge here. They’re all part of a lifestyle I grew up with, surrounded by my creative and energetic mum and sister in Bengaluru.

I suppose I never really stopped being that SUPW student.

Practice Makes Creative

Just like any other habit, a creative life requires practice.

It needs dedication, good company, good music (duh!), occasional challenges, a willingness to experiment—and the ability to laugh at yourself when things don’t quite work out.

The point isn’t necessarily to become an “artist.”

The point is to keep making, keep learning and keep growing.

So, if you’d like to develop your own creative habit, learn something new, or simply do some fun projects together…

Let’s talk.

Cheers,
Rad “SUPW” Ha