In September 2016, Writer Relocations carried out an unusual yet extremely prestigious exhibition shipment. We moved all the components of Bijoy Jain’s handmade pavilion to the MPavilion 2016 in Melbourne, Australia, from Mumbai, India.

What made the shifting of this installation so special

This was not like any other move we had handled before as the nature of the components – bamboo and karvi wood, the tight deadline, the weather, and the destination, all contributed to make this unusual shipment extremely difficult to execute.

The handmade pavilion used 7 km of bamboo – approximately 3000 bamboo sticks of varying thicknesses and lengths. Plus, roughly 500 panels made of sticks of karvi plant wood. Add to this a 15 FT tall Tazia, approximately 50 MT of stone, and close to 26 KM of rope.

The challenges in relocating the pavilion

The critical obstacle was the restriction on export of Bamboo without necessary certificates.

The client did not have these. We had to find a solution so that we did not lose time. Plus work around it and get the shipment through.

We did so by liaising with the various agencies to complete the documentation. We obtained the phytosanitary certificate, the NOC from the forest department, a wood declaration, and more.

Simultaneously we got our customs house agent to impress upon the Customs Department the prestigious nature of this shipment and the need to speed up the clearance process.

If all that wasn’t enough, there was a fumigation requirement of the Australian Quarantine Department for wood that needed to be handled.

This was rather complicated. We had to obtain the necessary fumigation certificate for Australia within the timelines in order for it to be acceptable at destination. The material was highly pest and insect susceptible, so there was worry on this. We were shipping the pavilion in the middle of the monsoons and this compounded the problem. There was only one agency approved by the Australian Quarantine Department for the fumigation in Mumbai.

Luckily for us, the Writer Relocations emphasis on associating with only the best in the business came to our rescue. Our fumigator was the only approved provider in Mumbai. Now with the clearances sorted out, we still had to deal with the Mumbai rains affecting the pavilion.

We solved this problem by instructing the client to create temporary polyethylene enclosures at the site from where we were transporting the pavilion. We then drove our close-bodied shuttle vehicles into these enclosures for loading the installation. We loaded the pavilion components back-to-back into the containers placed within the enclosures at the site.

This ensured that the bamboo did not get wet during the loading.

The sweet results of moving art

Two containers, 3×40′ and 1×20’ reached Melbourne well within the deadline. The pavilion was installed as planned.

What’s more, the pavilion received great reviews in the Australian media: https://www.timeout.com/melbourne/blog/a-hand-made-pavilion-has-popped-up-in-queen-victoria-gardens-for-summer-100516

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