PROJECTS

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Tomorrowland Foundation Music & Arts School by EkTara

Ek Tara, a Kolkata-based NGO, in collaboration with the Tomorrowland Foundation, has created a dynamic space dedicated to nurturing creativity in underprivileged children. Designed for flexibility and adaptability, it features open layouts, non-permanent spatial divisions, and adaptable furniture, allowing it to evolve based on the needs of its users. Both the school and the events terrace are designed to maximize natural light and incorporate sustainable materials, creating a warm and inspiring environment. Artwork by students and teachers enriches the walls, reflecting the vibrant school community. The open, adaptable areas encourage mixed activities, fostering collaboration, learning, and artistic expression while maintaining a strong visual connection throughout the space.

Service:
Interior Design / Spatial Concept Design

Location:
Kolkata, India

Project Type:
Cultural, Institutional, Social

Ballygunge Phari Park

Revitalising a Hidden Gem in Ballygunge

Tucked away in the heart of Ballygunge, a quiet pocket park awaits transformation. Our vision is to enhance its usability, foster community engagement, and create a vibrant recreational hub for all ages. Through thoughtful redesign, we aim to turn underutilized spaces into active, inclusive environments that cater to diverse needs. The park is reimagined into distinct zones, ensuring a harmonious coexistence of activities. By activating dead zones and optimizing corners, we introduce playgrounds for children, fitness stations for adults, and gathering spaces for cultural events—each designed with purpose, accessibility, and community in mind.

Service:
Reimagine and Landscape Design

Location:
Kolkata, India

Project Type:
Landscape, Public Space

Hydro-Communes

Water is a huge crisis in India, whether it’s the melting of the Himalayan glaciers or the devastating impact of many consecutive years of drought. A core reason for water related issues is the management of the resource across regional, geographical and political boundaries. At the heart of water management, is a spatial crisis.
The project is a proposal for the creation of hydro-communes throughout rural India in response to the crisis in water management.
In India rivers are considered sacred and manifestations of divine gods. But there is a duality between a culture that sees water as sacred and treats it’s provision as a duty for the preservation of life and another that sees water as a commodity, and it’s ownership and trade as fundamental corporate rights.
While water management saw a shift from communal management to centralised state management the condition of supply did not match the demand. The privatization and commodification of water only worsened the water crisis in India.
The project critiques the centralised management of large-scale infrastructure projects and proposes a shift in water management, its supply and distribution– by advocating the hydro-commune as a common realm for the local people. It attempts to shift the control of the resource back to the people who are local to the resource, who need and depend on it the most.
Because it is a common it requires a new local establishment to exist, to maintain and monitor it. It will be run by a group of women of the community breaking the barriers in water gendered spaces and envisions a cultural shift in gendered roles in rural Indian communities.
Conflicts today can be best understood, not as battles taking place in the landscape, but rather as a process allowing for the creation of new grounds. The hydro-commune embodies a shift in the imagination of water infrastructure in India and strives to alter the socio-political organisation of citizens while promoting community resilience.

Project Type:
Research & Design

Award:
Waterless World,
Non-Architecture, 2021

Early Childhood Learning Centre

For Ek Tara, a Kolkata-based NGO, we envisioned a nursery school space that fosters exploration and learning through spatial fluidity and sensory engagement. The design maximises daylight. The spatial layout prioritises flexibility and adaptability, with strategically positioned partitions and permeable dividers that double as integrated storage solutions. Columns are reinterpreted as trees, creating a biophilic environment that blurs the boundary between indoors and outdoors. A layered approach to spatial organisation ensures a seamless visual and physical connection across zones, fostering interaction and movement. A curated palette of natural materials and textured surfaces enhances tactile engagement, while vibrant, contextual graphics and murals, co-created with the teaching community, imbue the space with a sense of identity and ownership. The result is a playful, immersive learning environment that evolves with its users, encouraging creativity, curiosity, and collaboration.

Service:
Interior Design / Spatial Concept Design

Location:
Kolkata, India

Project Type:
Institutional

Delhi Farmstay

Service:
Masterplanning

Location:
Delhi, India

Project Type:
Landscape, Residential, Masterplanning

Darkened Silverlining: A Bidri Project

Among the vast variety of metalware produced for centuries in India, we are drawn and intrigued by the Bidri craft with its mysterious metal alloy and the technique for producing black velvety sheen on their silver inlaid surface. Bidri is a traditional metal handicraft from the Bidar region of Karnataka. As keen lovers of all things art and design and realising the significance of this almost forgotten craft form, we wanted to contribute to placing Bidris on a higher pedestal. This token is designed in collaboration with a local artisan and national award winner, Shah Rasheed Ahmed Quadri. This box has been made with much thought & love - it is a symbol of the union of two. The sun is a telling of a new beginning that awaits us.

Project Type:
Product Design , Collaboration

Location:
Karnataka

Year:
2021

Bidri Artist:
Shah Rasheed Ahmed Quadri

Poem by:
Adya Nevatia

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