Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Our obsession with mixing and merging urban landscapes and histories just moved to another level. We decided to let go of photoshopping for a bit and actually take a piece of Mumbai to Sao Paulo.

As part of the Sao Paulo Calling Exhibition curated by Architect Stefano Boeri and organized by the Secretariat de Habitaçao de Sao Paulo, images from Dharavi (Mumbai) became a part of the streetscape of Paraisopolis (Sao Paulo).

Residents of Paraisopolis chose pictures that appealed to them and in some ways corroborated their life, location or scenario across these two neighbourhoods that exist on either side of the globe.

Residents will exhibit them in their homes, shops, streets so that passers by can get a glimpse of the neighbourhood that is both so far away and astonishingly close in spirit. This live mashup continues to do what our mashed-up images always did – reveal connections across cities, to show they often emerge from similar impulses. From street vendors, to retailers, from residents to travelers, the neighbourhoods of Paraisopolis and Dharavi share as much in common as their distinct histories allow.

Together they represent the default mode in which the world is urbanizing when it is not being tamed by master planners and real estate developers. As we have shown in previous mashups there is no reason to view locally driven urban development as illegitimate. In fact, it is the acceptance of these local dynamics that have produced the celebrated heritage fabric of Italian old towns and the futurist urbanscapes of Tokyo’s suburbs.

That look of surprise and recognition, when people from Paraisopolis first saw the Dharavi images transformed into powerful gestures of solidarity as they lovingly chose their preferred image and stuck it firmly inside their worlds.

It was like a warm heartfelt handshake across thousands of miles.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Paraisopolis artist Barbela and Dharavi activist Bhau Korde. Click on the image to enlarge it and here to see the photo being exhibited.

Affordable Housing Programme at Sir JJ College of Architecture, Mumbai (2011-2012)

Curated by URBZ/Urbanology @ Sir JJ College of Architecture, Mumbai

Sponsored by Lafarge Studio+

Affordable housing is seen as both, a high social priority by the government and NGOs as well as an unprecedented financial opportunity by developers. The result is the large-scale production of low-cost housing blocks which quickly turn into vertical slums. In the meanwhile, local contractors and end-users are building far more numerous housing units of better quality at lower prices in Mumbai’s many unplanned settlements. Often dismissed as slums, locally developed neighbourhoods produce a powerful counter-narrative to the mass production of low-cost housing. This program brings together architects, engineers, contractors and end-users to explore this dynamic sector and innovate in the field of affordable housing.

Lafarge’s Studio Plus sponsored a four-month long programme on affordable housing that combined seminars, fieldwork, a workshop, a studio, a conference and an exhibition. This programme was held at Sir JJ College of Architecture in Mumbai and organized conjointly by URBZ/Urbanology and JJ Faculty members. About 60 fourth year architecture students participated in the programme from start to finish and made it a success. The programme was organized as follows:

Affordable Housing Seminar: Dec 5th, 2011 to Jan 22nd, 2012

Faculty and guest lecturers: Mustansir Dalvi, Yashwant Pitkar, Rahul Srivastava, Matias Echanove, Ayaz Rajgara, Ashley Fiahlo, Supriyo Bhattacharya, Jal Arya, Alexis de Ducla, Poonam Mulchandani and Sonia Faleiro.

The seminar was held twice a week over a 3 hours period for a period of six weeks. It involved guest lectures, discussions and fieldwork in various parts of the city. It aimed at giving a theoretical and practical introduction to the field of affordable housing from the point of view of incremental, local development. Students interacted with contractors in groups and studied the construction of small houses in locally developed neighbourhoods around the city. The houses they studied typically cost between INR 2 to 8 lakhs. Students used their architectural backgrounds to document and analyze everything that is related to house-building, including construction techniques, materials and finance, with a focus on processes rather than final products. In this phase of the program students were given lectures on the production of housing and habitats in unplanned neighbourhoods in Mumbai. They also engaged in fieldwork, spending as much time as they could with contractors in Dharavi, Shivaji Nagar (Govandi), Bhandup and Nerul.

urbz.net/JJAH/seminar

Contra-CT Workshop: Jan 23rd, 24th, 25th, 2012

Resource persons: Rajeev Kathpalia (Ahmedabad), Rakhi Mehra (Delhi), Marco Ferrario (Delhi), Sameep Padora (Mumbai), Poonam Mulchandani (Auroville), Alexis de Ducla (Chennai), Ritu Mohanty-Padora (Mumbai), Jean-Michel Laye (Chennai), Thomas Demschner (Lyon).

The workshop was held over 3 full days. It included practical work in small groups, collective brainstorming sessions and a mini-exhibition (internal to the school). It aimed at digging further into the conceptual, architectural, technical and creative aspects of local construction. It allowed students to express their own visions through the development of proposals. They had the opportunity to confront their learning from the field with the expertise of professionals in the field. At the end of the workshop, the students had a good foundation for their studio projects. The workshop happened between the phase of deconstruction; when students learned from the field, and before the reconstruction phase; when they were asked to imagine a larger affordable housing project based on their learning. Students presented the documentation they had produced in the first 6 weeks of the programme. Then they talked in greater detail with the guest resource people about all the aspects of housing development (finance, labor, materials and technical) and tried to imagine how they could optimize the construction process of a typical house, to the maximum extent possible. The students’ proposals were then presented to the contractors with whom they had worked during their fieldwork.

urbz.net/JJAH/workshop

Homegrown Cities Conference & Exhibition: March 29th, 30th, 2012

Speakers: Claudio Acioly (Nairobi), Michael Bell (New York), Bijal Bhatt (Ahmadabad), Amita Bhide (Mumbai), Mustansir Dalvi (Mumbai), B.V. Doshi (Ahmadabad), Alexis de Ducla (Chennai), Matias Echanove (Mumbai), Marco Ferrario (New Delhi), Pankaj Gupta (Mumbai), Rajeev Kathpalia (Ahmadabad), Rakhi Mehra (New Delhi), Marc Mimram (Paris), Rajiv Mishra (Mumbai), Sameep Padora (Mumbai), François Perrot (Paris), Yashwant Pitkar (Mumbai), Rahul Srivastava (Goa).

The exhibition gave the students an opportunity to showcase their work in the two phases of the programme. It not only features their documentation of local housing construction, but also the ideas they produced during the workshop and their proposals for a 100 unit affordable housing project. The conference brings together affordable housing experts from around the world and from various fields including architecture, industry, research, non-profit and international agencies. The aim of the conference is to look at the potential for creative collaborations between actors in the field, to support the local production of affordable housing and enhance its quality.

urbz.net/JJAH/conference

More photos here and here.

Nice article on Dharavi in Motherland featuring an interview of Rahul & Matias of URBZ.

We spent most of last week in Ahmedabad, the dynamic capital of Gujarat, which is developing just as fast as any other major Indian city today. In spite of the wide availability of land, real estate prices are shooting up in most parts due to the speculative bubble that is currently affecting India and boosting its economy.

Alexis de Ducla, a 28 year old affordable housing enthusiast who currently heads a special research project at Lafarge, a large cement company invited us to meet Bijal Bhatt, who heads the Mahila Housing Trust (MHT) –the housing and planning wing of SEWA (Self-Employed Women’s Association). MHT wants to start producing affordable housing for its members. This is a first for the organization, which has been focusing mostly on slum upgrading and advocacy till now. They have asked us offer recommendations that could help them achieve their objectives.

We visited a few social entrepreneurs and developers in Ahmedabad, including the up and coming DBS (Affordable Housing Strategy), a start up that is currently developing a 1400 flat housing project in south-east Ahmedabad. Flats are 22 sq.m to 62 sq.m and sell from INR 3.29 lakhs to 8.25 lakhs ($7,400 to $18,400), which is well below the market rate. For this project they have collaborated with SAATH an non-profit organization who’s goal is to create inclusive cities.

We interacted with people involved in various parts of the affordable housing production chain, including end users. The buyers we met were all looking forward to moving to a new house and neighbourhood, which would give them with better social status. A few of them mentioned that they were doing it for the children who were growing up and needed a better environment.

Affordable housing construction site in south-east Ahmedabad.

Many said that trust in the developer was an important factor in their choice. They started paying for the apartment years before the completion of the project and based their choice on the plans and brochures they were shown. Most wanted a ground floor apartment so they could park their vehicle in front and also open a small shop.

The developers we talked to said that the demand is so strong that it was hard for them to keep a cap on profits. To reserve a flat, buyers first have to deposit money on a bank account and apply for a loan. Rather than the total price of the flat, many affordable housing buyers are looking for loans with smaller EMI (Equated Monthly Installments), of less than INR 10,000 a month, which they feel they can repay, even if that means paying for the flat a few times over.

While some affordable housing developers have a clear social agenda, it is not so easy to help the poorest entirely through market mechanisms. The cap on profits, even at 20% or 10% doesn’t guarantee the fulfillment of the social objective. In some cases it simply amounts to sharing the profit with the buyer. That’s seems like a good thing for the buyer, but it could also drag the market price down artificially, forcing other builders to lower construction cost (and compromise even more on quality) to retain their existing profit margins.

Moreover, buyers of affordable housing are not always those for whom the product is intended. A builder reported that Gujarati friends from Canada and the US wanted to buy 100 affordable flats as an investment. Even with a strict screening of the buyers and provisions forbidding them from selling for 5 to 10 years, many flats end up being sold anyways. A lot of the housing market in India is underground and unaudited. It is the biggest money making and money laundering system in the country.

If affordable housing is so fashionable these days, it is not so much because it serves the needs of millions of poor people. It is rather because the market for middle-class and upper-middle housing is quickly saturating and overheating. Tens of thousands of upper-end flats are going unsold in Ahmedabad and Mumbai. Tens, maybe hundreds of thousands more are empty, owned by distant investors who have no intention of renting it to anybody. Many investors prefer to buy (or better build) and sell fast, before their property deteriorates. Unused flats have a higher exchange value because they are more fluid on the market. Affordable housing is indeed often turning into affordable real estate investment.

The saddest part of the story is the construction of countless cheap buildings all over the country that are not built to last. They quickly deteriorate and become costly to maintain. The developer is out of the building as soon as all the flats are sold and the responsibility for maintenance and repairs falls on all flat owners.

Affordable housing builders are betting on two things: fast turnover and the scaling up of their operation. This is why they are ready to lower their profit margin. But even then we heard buyers complain that the price of the same flat was always changing in response to the demand. This produces a highly unstable and risky market that is disproportionately based on the exchange value of housing, rather than on its use value. The result is a housing stock of extremely poor quality, which cannot really be said to contribute to the betterment of society.

A possible way out of this dangerous dynamic is to re-conceptualize the house as a process, rather than as a product. We have observed in Dharavi and many other habitats that were not planned nor developed by professional real estate developers, that a house is never just a house. It is also a tool for revenue generation, whether it is through renting, production or commercial activity. Moreover a house is never quite finished. It is always improving and being adapted to new needs. This cannot happen in mass housing. A large building can never improve over time.

The economy of construction itself is important. When a resident of Dharavi needs to fix his water pipes, he goes to a local contractor who has knowledge of the water system. If he needs a new roof, he asks a mason from his community, whom he trusts. The money invested stays in the neighbourhood. The proximity with contractors allows the incremental development of entire neighbourhoods. Building an affordable house is a process that combines economic development and finance with construction in such a way that they cannot be dealt with in isolation of each other.

The pot of gold at the bottom of the pyramid certainly lies in a new understanding of how finance and architecture can be combined. This however, will not solve the real problem of so many social entrepreneurs. There will always be a hard line below which the market cannot reach, these are the most needy (and perhaps numerous) people all around the world. Rather than trying to push the market down to impossible levels to try and reach to the poorest while satisfying the social imperative of social entrepreneurship, it may be time to think about value generation from a totally different perspective. And this thinking can only emerge from the ground-up.

More photos of Ahmedabad here.

November 9-16, 2010

In partnership with Khoj. With the support of Ford Foundation and the Norwegian Embassy. ‘KHOJ International Artists’ Association’ is an artist led alternative space for experimentation and international exchange based in India. Part of the global Triangle Arts Trust, KHOJ sees its role as an incubator for art and ideas, artistic exchange and dialogue in the visual arts.

The Urban Typhoon workshop invites artists, architects, activists and academics from all over the world to ideate with residents, grassroots groups and other users of Khirkee Village, New Delhi. The event aims at reclaiming the locality by collectively generating multiple ideas, visions and plans for its future.

During the week-long workshops all kinds of interventions and interactions will take place, stimulating debate, exchange and awareness. The workshop draws its energy and creativity from the involvement of local users, including business owners, housewives, children, teenagers, loiterers and other hoodies. It focuses on local participation and global engagement.

The workshop is documented throughout the week. The participants also produce all kinds of material, which is then uploaded on a user-generated Website. In addition, the output is translated into various installations, exhibitions, essays, festivals, architectural designs, urban plans and site-specific action, during and after the workshop. Its ultimate aim is to inform decision-makers on the aspirations and potential of Khirkee Village.

URBZ, has been conducting similar workshops in various places around the world including Shimokitazawa (Tokyo), Dharavi (Mumbai) and Galata (Istanbul).

The Urban Typhoon Khirkee (New Delhi) workshop is being organized in partnership with Khoj, a globally renowned artists collective based in that very neighbourhood. Khirkee is an ‘urban village’ in a city in fast forward mode, which may need to creatively reinvent itself if it is to preserve its identity in an increasingly alienating global context.

Khoj has operated from there for more than a decade and has initiated several projects, where artists have become urban practitioners projecting visions and revealing choices that formal actors may have overlooked.  In this partnership between Khoj and URBZ, we hope to organize an event that has a special significance to the world of urban engagement in which artists have a special role to play.

Participant Requirements:

The Urban Typhoon workshop is multicultural, multidisciplinary and a multimedia event. Students, urban planners, architects, designers, artists, sociologists, media artists, political activists, and anyone with a high motivation to work in urban spaces and willing to engage local communities for the week long duration of the workshop is welcome to join.

The objective is to produce creative alternatives for the future of a neighborhood threatened by limited official choices and imagination.

Please fill up the registration form, including a 100-word bio-note of yourself and a face-picture.

We will be in regular touch through e-mail after that.

Travel and boarding expenses are to be borne by the participants (so,don’t wait to make travel bookings! We will also make reservations at reasonable rates in local lodges and hotels to facilitate the process).