Urban Typhoon Workshop in Koliwada, Mumbai: March 16-22, 2008
Participatory Urban Design & the Future of Alternative Communities

“The Urban Typhoon brought together artists, architects, activists and academics from all over the world with the residents of Koliwada, Dharavi to collectively generate ideas, visions and plans, and archive biographies and histories. The workshop’s philosophy is based on the idea that communities should be allowed to determine their future and that everyone, no matter the age, language or qualification should be allowed to participate in the process.

The Urban Typhoon workshop is a global experiment in participatory design. It is directly connected to the various communities of Dharavi and its grassroots community groups.
The workshop is multicultural, multidisciplinary and multimedia. Students, urban planners, architects, designers, artists, sociologists, media artists, political activists, utopists, and other nomads to come together for a week to imagine the future of Koliwada.

The objective is to produce creative alternatives for the future of a neighborhood threatened by a redevelopment plan of the government as well as a multimedia testimony to the unique spirit of Koliwada.”

Found this while hypertexting… looking at the organizers of UBIQUITOUS CITY:

Adidas Innovation Center in Paris

Wii Fit

My iPod shuffle hair clip. Phone-pix: Eliot.

Science Daily. November 1, 2007. Home of the Future
Interactive Computing Experts Design New Devices For Everyday Use

“Computer scientists have found new ways to use technology to make people’s lives easier. Setting up cameras in the kitchen to record each step made in cooking helps cooks pick up where they left off if distracted. An electronic picture can use symbols to convey a wealth of information — the more stripes on the barber pole, the more traffic on the way home. A camera worn around a person’s neck can interpret gestures, transmit them to electronic devices, replacing remote controls.”

Buckminster Fuller: Starting with the Universe
on view at the Withney June 26, 2008-September 21, 2008

“R. Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) was one of the great American visionaries of the 20th century. Best-known as the inventor of the geodesic dome, Fuller devoted much of his life to resolving the gap between the sciences and the humanities, which he believed was preventing society from taking a comprehensive view of the world. His theories and innovations traversed the worlds of architecture, visual art, literature, mathematics, molecular biology, and environmental science and have had a deep impact on all of those fields.”

“The micro compact home [m-ch] is a lightweight compact dwelling for one or two people. Its compact dimensions of 2.6m cube adapt it to a variety of sites and circumstances, and its functioning spaces of sleeping, working / dining, cooking and hygiene make it suitable for everyday use.

Informed by aviation and automotive design and manufactured at the micro compact home production centre in Austria, the m-ch can be delivered throughout Europe with project individual graphics and interior finishes.

The product was first launched in Munich in November 2005 with the development of a case study village sponsored by O2 Germany, which is currently occupied by students of TU Munich.”

Check the micro-compact home website.

Informal Architecture. From the archives of the Tate. Information via We Make Money Not Art (Sweet selection of vidéos by Régine)… And the full listing.