India, Nov. 10 -- I have always liked beautiful things. As a young man in Delhi, while preparing for my CA, I was very fond of clothes. I used to go to Janpath to shop for shirts-back in the 1970s, you could get three for Rs 10 from the export-surplus piles. They were made of gauzy, hippie cotton. Looking back, perhaps that was the start of my love for collecting-the idea that an object can express personality. My wife, Renuka, and I have collected more than 2,500 pieces over 40 years, and we now have about 1,000.

The First Carpet When I moved to the US, I carried that instinct with me. The first carpet I bought was in New York in 1988. I was working in Manhattan and would pass a carpet shop every day on my walk to work. One beautiful pi...