urbz, Room 56/AB, 1St Floor, T-Junction Dharavi, Koliwada, Sion-Bandra Link Road, Mumbai (2024)

26/04/2024

Mañana taller de construcción en guadua (bambu)para el proyecto de la biblioteca comunitaria . En este taller tendremos al Arquitecto especialista en construcción en guadua quien nos hará una introducción sobre los fundamentos y luego un taller práctico de los componentes estructurales de la biblioteca comunitaria. Invitados.

14/03/2024

students are back for Handstorm, 2024!

The day started early with an excursion into the Mithi river near Dharavi Koliwada, a fishing village in Dharavi, and ended with a walk through Worli Koliwada, another one of Mumbai's fishing villages poised on a promontory overlooking the Arabian sea.

The Kolis have inhabited and tended to these landscapes for generations, as the city continues to grow around them.

14/03/2024

students are back for Handstorm, 2024!

The day started early with an excursion into the Mithi river near Dharavi Koliwada, a fishing village in Dharavi, and ended with a walk through Worli Koliwada, another of Mumbai's fishing villages, located on a promontory overlooking the Arabian sea.

The Kolis have inhabited and tended to these landscapes for generations, as the city continues to grow around them.

01/02/2024

𝗿𝗲:𝗮𝗿𝗰 𝘀𝗲𝗹𝗲𝗰𝘁𝘀 𝘂𝗿𝗯𝘇!

We have been selected to develop our dream project in Dharavi Koliwada! We are grateful to the .institute for making this dream come true. 𝗿𝗲:𝗮𝗿𝗰 𝗶𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗶𝘁𝘂𝘁𝗲 is a Copenhagen-based organisation exploring and enabling diverse architecture and urban practices.

Click the 𝙡𝙞𝙣𝙠 𝙞𝙣 𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙗𝙞𝙤 to learn about how we got here.

11/01/2024

We take a moment to reflect on 𝘂𝗿𝗯𝘇's achievements in 2023 and our objectives for 2024. We started in Mumbai in 2008 where we are busier than ever. Over the years we expanded our activities to Goa, Bogota, Geneva and now Paris. For 2024, we make the good resolution of communicating better and more frequently with our friends and followers!

READ the 𝗳𝘂𝗹𝗹 𝗯𝗹𝗼𝗴 on urbz.net.

22/12/2023

It was great fun to have students from visit our office in Dharavi Koliwada. Had an exciting walk through the homegrown neighborhoods of Koliwada (fishing village) and Kumbharwada (potters village), with this multidisciplinary and curious group.

Picture courtesy of

26/11/2023

Último taller del año para la consolidación del Cine comunitario en Altos del Pino Cazuca. Cupos limitados ñ. Info DM. Organizan Eldoradofilms

02/11/2023

We recently travelled from Mumbai to Chiplun, and onward to Sawarde, a small village in the Konkan. While we enjoyed the abundant landscape we also discovered some sobering realities.

Click the link in our bio to read the full article.

24/10/2023

Our article on the Toolhouse was published in the Built Environment, a quarterly publication on a diverse range of contemporary issues, the focus of this issue is live-work spaces.

We are proud to weave in tales from Dharavi, Mumbai into this fabric of arguments that will make a difference to the way all cities are understood in the future.

Visit our website urbz.net to read snippets of the article from the latest issue of the Built Environment - 'Homes that Work', Volume 49 - number 3.

23/10/2023

Resultados del taller Ciclo de acabados en guadua para la consolidación del Cine Comunitario Cazuca. Próximo noviembre continuamos con las actividades. Invitados!. ._escape

19/10/2023

Invitados a este taller de construcción en Guadua ( Bamboo) el próximo sábado toda la info DM. Organizan urbz Colombia y Fundación Proyecto Escape

03/10/2023

John Turner, who just passed away, was an advocate of incremental development through community participation. His ideas have inspired some of the most progressive schemes and projects in Mumbai and other parts of India. His ideas are as relevant today as they were in the 1970s. We republish an essay about his work and influence from Lima to Mumbai:
“John Turner - From Lima to Mumbai”
Link in the bio to read the full essay

Photo 1: John Turner (Credit: Wolfgang Schmidt/Right Livelihood)
Photo 2: cover page of “Housing by People (1976) continued Turner’s preoccupation
Photo 3: Turner’s photographs of incremental housing processes in El Ermitaño in Lima (Credit: John F C Turner)
Photo 4: Guide for the organisation of ‘pueblos jóvenes’
Photos 5 and 6: Bhandup is a homegrown neighbourhood in the northwestern suburbs of Mumbai. Officially 85% of the area is classified as slums. Yet, the view from inside shows good-looking streets and houses. The residents are often of working or middle-class backgrounds, and a strong sense of solidarity prevails in their neighbourhood. We define homegrown neighbourhoods as settlements that have been developed over time by local actors (residents, builders and construction material providers).
Photo 7: Charkop in Kandivali West, Mumbai. The World Bank site and services provided access to housing to over 20,000 families in that area alone in the late 1980s, through the “Bombay Infrastructure Development Program. Altogether, the program sold housing to about 90,000 low-income households over nine years.

30/08/2023

Lanzamiento del libro Las Escalas de lo Humano de la Universidad de Los Andes. Pudimos reflexionar sobre los procesos de apoyo mutuo y autogestión en los barrios populares y las acciones y los aprendizajes de Urbz en los últimos años en Colombia.

30/08/2023

Lanzamiento del libro Las Escalas de lo Humano de la Universidad de Los Andes. Pudimos reflexionar sobre los procesos de apoyo muto u autogestión en los barrios populares y las acciones y los aprendizajes de Urbz en los últimos años en Colombia.

23/08/2023

Taller para el mejoramiento del Cine Comunitario, espacio gestionado por la organización comunitaria Proyecto Escape. Inscripciones abiertas, cupos limitados. Información DM.

20/03/2023

Our Handstorm workshops in Dharavi with the "Engineers for Social Impact" from NYU Abu Dhabi happening again after 3 years !!!!

30/11/2022

Urbz Colombia fue invitado a participar en el 1 Foro Urbano Nacional de Vivienda Costa Rica y presentar la experiencia en temas de Autogestión y apoyo mutuo en asentamientos populares en Colombia. Participaron instituciones de Argentina, Perú, Salvador, Guatemala, Costa Rica y Colombia.

24/05/2022

Demolition of heritage spaces as the encroaching overdevelopment of housing blocks displaces local communities, destroys local culture, and erases a foundational part of Bombay’s wider history.
Save Khotachiwadi!!

“Preserve Heritage, Support the Community!”

Bungalow no. 28, Khotachiwadi is under threat of complete demolition and re-development. Reach out to your local representatives and ask that the Mumbai Heritage Conservation Committee be granted authority to oversee our city's built heritage."

11/05/2022

We would like to invite everyone who is interested in learning about and taking action to address the current situation in Khotachiwadi.

We will go over the previous studies and reports once more and speak about how can we take simple measures to reconsider the recommendations made in previous reports, as well as fresh recommendations from residents and experts.

13/04/2022

The men of steel: a directory of metal artisans of Khetwadi that helped us make models for the Homegrown Street. A larger article can be found on our website which explores collective intelligence of the 6th Kumbharwada Lane.

01/04/2022

Beyond the Urban-Rural Binary is a 2-part article that explores how Goa represents a distinctive pattern of urbanization, representing the coevolution of its countryside and urban centres. In the second part we take a closer look at two countries- Italy and France, each as an example of one of the two impulses mentioned above, starting with the former.

Goa is as an example which demonstrates an alternative urban and has the potential to develop further into a sustainable model of urban future. Goa needs to be understood as an urban system, not as a city.

Revision of the relationship between capitalism and the city, and the urban-rural binary might lead to new solutions. We question the megacities as symbols of advanced capitalism, industrialization. Are there no better solutions? The growth model is doubtful if it results in further environmental destruction. Cities don’t need to be one centralized agglomeration but can also function like a living web spread over valleys and waterways, co-existing with farms and plantation forests.

31/03/2022

A new blog on homegrown developments explores metal enclosure. Check it out through the link in bio.

29/03/2022

urbz hosted the Workshop Pointe Nord 27.03.2022
1 workshop | 10 sessions | 100 participants

Exhibition of the results coming soon!

26/03/2022

WORKSHOP POINTE NORD, GENEVA 27.03.2022

urbz has been working with architects with the Sate of Geneva to organise an ambitious and innovative participatory process for a new neighbourhood planned at the heart of the city called Pointe Nord. This post-industrial brownfield bordering the Arve river is home to two independent theaters and an underground nightclub. The cultural actors are associated to the participatory process, and along with other participants coming from the city and beyond, they are imagining their future in a development that will comprise office towers and housing, along with a park and publicly accessible sheds. This day-long workshop is a key moment in a 6 months long process. A public exhibition of the results is planned in June.

Illustrations: Hugh Ebdy for .net

26/03/2022

WORKSHOP POINTE NORD, GENEVA 27.03.2022

urbz has been working with architects with the Sate of Geneva to organise an ambitious and innovative participatory process for a new neighbourhood planned at the heart of the city called Pointe Nord. This post-industrial brownfield bordering the Arve river is home to two independent theaters and an underground nightclub. The cultural actors are associated to the participatory process, and along with other participants coming from the city and beyond, they are imagining their future in a development that will comprise office towers and housing, along with a park and publicly accessible sheds. This day-long workshop is a key moment in a 6 months long process. A public exhibition of the results is planned in June.

Illustrations: Hugh Ebdy for

26/03/2022

WORKSHOP POINTE NORD, GENEVA 27.03.2022

urbz has been working with architects with the State of Geneva to organise an ambitious and innovative participatory process for a new neighbourhood planned at the heart of the city called Pointe Nord. This post-industrial brownfield bordering the Arve river is home to two independent theaters and an underground nightclub. The cultural actors are associated to the participatory process, and along with other participants coming from the city and beyond, they are imagining their future in a development that will comprise office towers and housing, along with a park and publicly accessible sheds. This day-long workshop is a key moment in a 6 months long process. A public exhibition of the results is planned in June.

Illustrations: Hugh Ebdy for

26/03/2022

WORKSHOP POINTE NORD, GENEVA 27.03.2022

urbz has been working with architects with the Sate of Geneva to organise an ambitious and innovative participatory process for a new neighbourhood planned at the heart of the city called Pointe Nord. This post-industrial brownfield bordering the Arve river is home to two independent theaters and an underground nightclub. The cultural actors are associated to the participatory process, and along with other participants coming from the city and beyond, they are imagining their future in a development that will comprise office towers and housing, along with a park and publicly accessible sheds. This day-long workshop is a key moment in a 6 months long process. A public exhibition of the results is planned in June.

Illustrations: Hugh Ebdy for

26/03/2022

WORKSHOP POINTE NORD, GENEVA 27.03.2022

urbz has been working with architects with the State of Geneva to organise an ambitious and innovative participatory process for a new neighbourhood planned at the heart of the city called Pointe Nord. This post-industrial brownfield bordering the Arve river is home to two independent theaters and an underground nightclub. The cultural actors are associated to the participatory process, and along with other participants coming from the city and beyond, they are imagining their future in a development that will comprise office towers and housing, along with a park and publicly accessible sheds. This day-long workshop is a key moment in a 6 months long process. A public exhibition of the results is planned in June.

Illustrations: Hugh Ebdy for .net

25/03/2022

We are hosting a discussion on locally-led adaptation at the Gobeshona Global Conference 2 organised by ICCCAD. Through this session we hope to share some of the lived experiences and on-ground action projects in the context of urban indigenous communities of Mumbai and locally led adaptation.

Tune in on Sunday 27 March at 1:30 PM IST. Registration link is in our bio.