An Escheresque Orientalism

How should I feel about an Indian five-star hotel that adopts an Orientalist aesthetic? The pragmatic side of me says that as a service-designer, I should understand the expectations of the foreign tourist demographic, especially the older, retired Europeans and Americans visiting the India they’ve read about by authors like Rudyard Kipling.

That the hotel industry is a part of India’s service driven economy, and that the hotel’s decor, and its staff uniforms affect an orientalist aesthetic to meet the idealised expectations of a particular tourist demographic. Maybe it is even designed that way to help inhibit a uniquely Indian variant of the Paris Syndrome.

That the manager confided in our group, (we were there to conduct an ongoing ethnography of the local culture) with not insignificant amount of pride, that he has personally trained the staff in posture and body language, which I observed to be excessively submissive.

So, there is a side of me which is also offended.

The hotel looks like a Hollywood set designer’s idea of a medieval Indian setting—if he got his inspiration from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. There is a copious amount of drapery looping down from the ceiling, brass kettles on colonial teepoys and Indian weaponry adorning the walls. The hotel architecture and the decor mimics a Western fantasy of an Indian palace.

Even though I understand why someone designed the hotel this way, I’m offended enough to yell “Cultural Appropriation y’all”, except, the owners of the Hotel are Indians, and it is located here, in India.

Is it still Orientalism if the affectation is by Indians?

Notes

The featured image is A.I. generated, but the aesthetic of the actual hotel comes pretty close.