Dharavi’s massive redevelopment project aims to turn it into a ‘world-class’ neighborhood, but this vision risks erasing its unique identity and thriving homegrown economy. Instead of replacing it with glass towers and luxury spaces, Dharavi could be a model for a ‘world-grown city’—one that values its community-driven development while staying connected to the global economy.

Living Euljiro is a film directed by Liron Shalit. Liron has been creating award-winning short documentaries since 2017, exploring themes such as social issues, human rights, disability, natural disasters, and urban life. Since relocating to Seoul in 2022, he has focused on documenting disappearing spaces and communities, capturing the distinctive culture of Euljiro and the stories of the people who live and work there. 

Every kaccha house transforming into a pukka house is a story worth telling – one which is extremely significant to residents and the development of the city at large.

Local newspapers doubled, tripled and eventually quadrupled with classifieds about the shiny, affordable, chic new buildings with swimming pools coming up in every empty corner.

Exploring the visual anatomy of Dharavi's fishing village

Based on a multi-year research with the Mobile Lives Forum on the linkages between Mumbai and Konkan villages this essay, first published in the magazine FuturArc, describes an Indian model of urbanization.

More than a third of Bogota, the capital of Colombia, is estimated to be self-built by the inhabitants, mainly in the periphery of the city. In this article, we learn from Andrés Sánchez of urbz Colombia about the emerging forms of organisation and constant transformation in these self-built neighborhoods.

Pushpa has been living in Dharavi since she was born. Our day starts with her bright smile as she sells pulses right outside the urbz office. We recently had a little chat with her.

On May 9 - 10 urbz brought together collectives and institutions in Cali, Colombia. This is part of a 6 months project to develop a system to promote locally driven initiatives. 

The Handstorm workshop brought together various actors from all around the world to build things that could improve the neighbourhood based on discussions with residents and with the help of local artisans