J10 Housing & Slums

In Ahmednagar, residents of a slum design their own homes By Avantika Shankar 3 April 2022    https://www.architecturaldigest.in/story/in-ahmednagar-residents-of-a-slum-design-their-own-homes/ 
This redevelopment project at the Sanjaynagar slum in Ahmednagar could change the way we think about communities and spaces. In a pioneering social design initiative, design studio Community Design Agency is implementing a community-led redevelopment project for the Sanjaynagar slum. Led by founder and managing director Sandhya Naidu Janardhan, and created in collaboration with local NGO Snehalaya, the programme aims to build safe, healthy and vibrant homes for the residents. In the process, it also hopes to demonstrate the importance of community participation in social sector development projects.

Space is undoubtedly a constraint, but the residents themselves have demonstrated how out-of the-box design thinking can help open up a layout. “The way the people who live in slums use space is most efficient,” she says, “In fact, when architects and planners go in, we introduce inefficiencies in many ways, because we are so conditioned to say, for instance, this is your living room and this is your dining area. On the other hand, they may have their eating space and studying space and kitchen space all in one place.”

Comment : More than two decades ago, in Mumbai SPARC, and the Slum Dweller federation had done a participatory design, which suggested the higher height rooms, to allow for stacking within the house, as needs for privacy, odd hour sleep, storage was heavy.