The Homegrown City - by Matias Sendoa Echanove & Rahul Srivastava (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

A radical new perspective of the relationship between the city and slum: from the researchers and architects behind the groundbreaking design practise URBZ.

By the middle of this century, over 3 billion people will live in settlements typically called slums or referred to euphemistically as "informal". These unplanned, though often functionally integrated neighbourhoods are seen as the antithesis of the planned metropolis. But, as Echanove and Srivastava argue, the homegrown city is a fragile yet resilient part of an urban system, which has been dismissed and brutalised for too long.

The Homegrown City is about how cities develop and evolve through the actions of those who use it. Echanove and Srivastava present this user-generated city, in opposition to the speculative and commercialised approach that dominates the urban imagination today. They argue that the starting point to solving questions from unequal distribution of wealth, to access to housing, or the environmental crisis lies in a grounded approach to urban development, which recognises the value of collective intelligence and citizen participation.

Through a series of case studies from Asia, Europe and the Americas the book challenges the way we look at the city by connecting it to those who build it, pointing to how it can grow for the benefit of all.

URBZ is the groundbreaking design and research group founded in Dharavi, Mumbai, 2008 and now working across the world. Their hugely influential work has been exhibited in major museums and institutions in the US, Europe and Latin America. The Homegrown City is their first book on the most urgent questions of the 21st century.

About the Author

Matias Echanove and Rahul Srivastava co-founded urbz.net, an experimental action and research collective specialising in participatory planning and design. Its clients include community groups, municipal governments, international organisations, private foundations and corporations. urbz has worked with citizens, organisations and municipalities in Mumbai, Bogotá, São Paulo, Geneva and Seoul. urbz's work was exhibited at MoMA in New York, MAXXI in Rome, MAK in Vienna, Istanbul Design Biennial, Chicago Architecture Biennial, Sao Paulo Cultural Center, and Bhau Daji Lad City Museum in Mumbai. They have been published in journals such as The Hindu, The Guardian, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Art India, Domus (Milan), Oxford University Press and Strelka Press (Moscow). The Homegrown City is the first major publication that summarises what they have learned from more than a decade of practice and engagement with cities.

Matias has studied Economics and Political Science at London School of Economics, Urban Planning at Columbia University in New York and Urban Information Systems at University of Tokyo.

Rahul has studied Sociology and Anthropology at St. Xavier's College (Mumbai), JNU (Delhi) and University of Cambridge (UK).