This project is based in Khirki, an urban village in the south of Delhi, India. It introduces spaces that better integrate urban informality with formal development and lend a higher degree of legitimacy to small-scale businesses in the face of increasing socio-economic unsurety. Specifically, this project looks at consolidating and strengthening material manufacturing and artist networks within Khirki through skill training, resource management, digitization and exposure. The project specifically deals with multiple local artist and makers NGO’s to establish a space that helps them better connect with individual artists and material manufacturers within Khirki. It would incorporate locally available labor and material in its construction - providing the community with a means to contribute directly. Observing a model of shared ownership across individuals, NGO’s and the government agencies - it argues for collective urban efforts. It establishes that providing sustainable spaces for skill training, community gathering, welfare and learning along with infrastructure that reinforces neglected systems of resource management is vital towards the long term strengthening and de-stigmatization of Delhi’s urban informality.

Raghav Rayasam

︎Year 5