No one throws a party like Tahir Sultan

As any Gen Zer may put it, dinner at Tahir Sultan’s is a vibe. You enter through an iron gate and immediately you’re tempted to reach for your phone and capture the candle-lit courtyard lined with large ceramic pots. Next, up a narrow flight of stairs, you can already hear his voice animating the party somewhere. The first floor I visit is where Sultan has created a tasting room with 1800 Tequila. Guests are streaming in, snapping selfies and clinking coupes. Back to the staircase, I choose a different landing on the floor above: people are gabbing about dinner, servers are bringing drinks, and some Levantine-themed hors d’oeuvres are doing the rounds.

Sultan’s home and concept store, simply called Makaan, is a space where the party changes tempo as you move from one room to the next. The last room is where the food is laid out—an elaborate tablescape where tropical candelabra, bronze-tinged parrots, and star-shaped platters somehow come together to make the most arresting table spread. The food—large platters of mezze (with hands-down the best hummus and babaganoush I’ve eaten), an assortment of crisp, light salads, and flavourful meats—is vibrant and inviting. “Dhokla with cauliflower puree, pumpkin borani with idli, seaweed rice, eastern prawns, chestnut avocado salad, prawn curry, chicken morsels with labneh and pomegranate molasses, fesenjān, ghormeh sabzi, saffron rice, Afghan chicken in a yoghurt sauce, wonderful versions of chaat, and so much more,” the self-taught Sultan rattles off a list of items that his eponymous catering service, one of the most important numbers in the culinary black book of the Pink City, has put together today.

The Kuwaiti-Indian polyglot moved to Jaipur in 2020 and is one of those people who are outrageously talented at making things beautiful. One look inside his home, which doubles as his design store, shows that he really celebrates beauty—culinary and otherwise. Sultan’s creativity spans multiple disciplines—fashion, art, interiors, food, and design collide in his world and eponymous brand. His aim is to bridge and reinterpret the design gap between the East and the West. “I just choose to cast a wider net with the manner in which I express myself, hopefully inspiring and educating people along the way,” he tells me. 

No one really knows how and why Sultan got to India, but the little backstory I get assures me why we’d gladly keep him. After graduating from Central Saint Martins School of Design in London, Sultan interned with John Galliano and Alexander McQueen before setting up his own fashion label in Kuwait. When he moved to Rajasthan in 2020 (“I could feel that Jaipur was on the brink of exploding and I wanted to be a part of that movement. It was a very different town then”), he forayed into food with a culinary concept focusing on Levantine, Persian, and Gulf cuisine.

Two years later, he opened Makaan—a moody, dramatic three floor-concept, off a quiet bylane in Jaipur, which serves as his store and residence. It’s also a playground for all of his elaborate dinners. “I see Makaan as a crossroads where contemporary ceramics meet Naga antiques and Far-Eastern treasures. It was created as a place designers visit to source key pieces. We have our in-house collection consisting of vases, lamps, and candle holders, as well as bespoke pieces created by young artists and artisans. The emphasis is on sustainability and contemporising craft.” 

Whichever level you enter from, the space looks like it’s been designed as a living room. There are intimate corners everywhere, perfect for entertaining, which, Sultan says, is in his DNA. His father and aunt were the founders of The Sultan Gallery, the first gallery in the Gulf, which played a seminal role in bringing Andy Warhol’s work to Kuwait. ‘In Warhol’s diaries, he wrote that my family... I think the exact words were ‘they really know how to throw a party’,” he recalls. Tall praise from the man who taught the world to party with Factory as well as Studio 54.

Sultan’s memories are a bit hazy, but it seems like the parties that were hosted at his home were never just parties so much as a means of breaking social norms, promoting art and culture. “My brothers and I would sneak to the window to spy on what was going on. There were always interesting people—Shabana Azmi was once asleep on the couch after a day of filming, Rajiv Sethi brought an entire circus for my brother’s birthday, and I once asked Zandra Rhodes why she was dressed like Miss Piggy; she was not amused,” Sultan says with his characteristic dramatic flair.

Genes do pass on, and I can confirm Tahir Sultan today is a consummate host. He is charming, chatty, and has that easy air of a debonair butterfly who can flit between conversations as he surveys the different corners at his party. The food and design show that he is meticulous about party preparations, but there is still an edge of spontaneity and impulsiveness to the whole night that makes his parties so fun.

It’s what prompted him to create this format of elaborate, invite-only dinners where visitors can have a full sensory experience and also meet other interesting, creative, dynamic individuals. Like a modern-day salon. “This space is contemporary and has a very clear vision and direction in terms of my taste. I started catering at my friends’ request and then moved on to dinners with food and local friends. It soon evolved into this format where people would come into an amazing space for a premium price and just have this out-of-the box experience. The dinners I host are making people aware of the different facets of Jaipur and just how dynamic it can be. It’s a new-age salon—very exclusive with a strict door policy.”

In January, when the air is chilly and every literary-minded individual had packed up and headed to the Jaipur Literature Festival, I found myself enter through the same iron gate into a house filled with some of the best literary names and creative minds. William Dalrymple, Max Hollein and Navina Haidar from the Met in New York, food entrepreneur Aditi Dugar, author-chef Susan Jung, hotelier Abhimanyu Alsisar, Gem Palace’s Sid and Samir Kasliwal, art consultant Noelle Kadar and her husband Akshat Ghiya of Tallin Jewels were just some of the people I met briefly. “The people at my dinners are always hard-working, interesting people who excel at what they do and bring their knowledge and passion to the table, figuratively speaking,” Sultan adds.

Amrapali’s Akanksha Arora, a friend and frequent guest on his party guestlist, says, “Tahir is the warmest host. You will never know who you will meet at his place. It’s always an interesting mix. There are always different age groups, visitors from all over the world. You’ll find photographers, artists, models, authors… I love his Arabian food—that spiced cauliflower and hummus is a personal favourite—but what he is best at is his spontaneous dishes when you show up at his home unplanned.”

If you know Sultan, you know he’s not one to mince words. He presides over these dinners, more often than not, dressed in black, with statement accessories—today he’s donning lines of a sumptuous uncut-diamond necklace and two Hermès belts. He’s stressed about the food setup, but he snaps out of it in a minute as he sees more familiar faces come in. There’s this energy and charm around him; it’s like his spirit animates the party.

I ask him how one can get invited to one of these soirées. He raises an eyebrow. “You can’t,” he says, “This is the most super-exclusive experience in the country. It pushes people out of their comfort zone to really bring their best to the table. Only if you’re interesting will you make the cut.”

I return home, my belly and mind both sated and reassured that, somehow, I still make the cut.