Artwala Foundation

The Problem

Independent Indian artists had no professional digital sales channel. Most were selling through Instagram DMs and WhatsApp — manually negotiating prices, collecting payments via UPI screenshots, and coordinating delivery themselves. It was unsustainable at scale and presented no credibility to institutional buyers.

The Artwala Foundation needed a platform that gave artists government-recognised, professional storefronts, with proper checkout, automated logistics, and no technical skill required from the artists themselves.

Constraints

• Artists are non-technical, the entire store setup and product upload flow had to be zero-developer, operable by someone with only a smartphone.

• Artwork images are high-resolution raw photos, Cloudinary processing had to handle optimisation automatically without quality loss.

• AICTE recognition required structured seller onboarding data, category taxonomy, and transaction audit trails built from day one.

• Razorpay Route split payments had to clear directly to artists, the foundation couldn't sit as a financial intermediary.

• Shiprocket integration had to work for sellers with no logistics experience, label generation and courier handoff had to be a single step.

How Nexolve Built It

A Next.js marketplace with Supabase data layer, artist storefronts are self-serve, Cloudinary handles all image processing, Razorpay Route splits payments directly to artist accounts, and Shiprocket automates nationwide dispatch.

1. 1

   Self-managed artist storefronts

   Each artist gets a self-serve storefront where they upload artwork images, set pricing, write descriptions, and manage their own inventory, all without developer involvement. Cloudinary handles image optimisation and responsive serving automatically.

2. 2

   Cloudinary image pipeline

   Raw artwork photos uploaded by artists are processed through Cloudinary's transformation pipeline on upload, auto-cropped to product aspect ratios, watermarked, and served in WebP format at the correct device resolution. No manual image editing required.

3. 3

   Direct Razorpay checkout

   Buyers checkout directly with Razorpay, UPI, debit card, net banking, and EMI. Payments clear directly to the artist's payout account via Razorpay Route, minus the platform fee, within 2 business days.

4. 4

   Nationwide Shiprocket delivery

   Order confirmation triggers a Shiprocket API call that fetches carrier rates, generates a prepaid dispatch label, and sends tracking details to the buyer via email. Artists print the label and hand off to the courier, no logistics setup required.

5. 5

   AICTE documentation and structured data

   Government recognition required formal platform documentation and structured product data, category taxonomy, seller onboarding records, transaction logs, and GST compliance metadata. These were built into the platform architecture from day one.

Tech Stack

Outcomes

• Artists replaced Instagram DM sales with government-recognised storefronts, credibility and discoverability improved immediately.

• Zero logistics setup for artists, Shiprocket label auto-generated on order confirmation, courier handoff is a single step.

• Razorpay Route splits payment directly to the artist account, no manual payouts, no financial intermediary delays.

• Cloudinary handles all image processing automatically, high-resolution uploads served optimised without any artist action.

• AICTE recognition achieved, structured data architecture satisfied all documentation requirements from the start.