Abstract
Informal areas take up 65% of Cairo. Mansheyet Nasser - one of the biggest informal areas in Cairo - alone hosts more than 2,000,000 inhabitants. Several NGO founders feel responsible to create a model that fixes informal areas’ problems (such as education, employment and health). Especially since the 25th of January revolution, they’ve been doing their role in Sustainable development. Currently these NGOs are responsible for providing opportunities that generate income for informal area female inhabitants, this study focuses on sustaining this income through community centric design. Moreover, the designer’s role was more of moderating between the informal area, the inhabitants and the NGO rather than designing only. Aiming the women could have sustainable income, the participants’ needs and communities were investigated using Lucy Kimbell’s story world method. This resulted in 3 women sewing clothes that are sold using a well branded online store. A sample from the store’s target group were invited to participate in several participatory design workshops to create the chosen products. This action research draws attention to the impact of community centric design on socio-economic status in informal areas.
Keywords
Community Centric Design, Participatory design, Cairo, Informal Areas, NGOs
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/learnxdesign.2019.11090
Citation
Attia, J.G.,and Anssary, A.E.(2019) Towards Community Centric Design in Cairo Informal Areas, in Börekçi, N., Koçyıldırım, D., Korkut, F. and Jones, D. (eds.), Insider Knowledge, DRS Learn X Design Conference 2019, 9-12 July, Ankara, Turkey. https://doi.org/10.21606/learnxdesign.2019.11090
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.
Towards Community Centric Design in Cairo Informal Areas
Informal areas take up 65% of Cairo. Mansheyet Nasser - one of the biggest informal areas in Cairo - alone hosts more than 2,000,000 inhabitants. Several NGO founders feel responsible to create a model that fixes informal areas’ problems (such as education, employment and health). Especially since the 25th of January revolution, they’ve been doing their role in Sustainable development. Currently these NGOs are responsible for providing opportunities that generate income for informal area female inhabitants, this study focuses on sustaining this income through community centric design. Moreover, the designer’s role was more of moderating between the informal area, the inhabitants and the NGO rather than designing only. Aiming the women could have sustainable income, the participants’ needs and communities were investigated using Lucy Kimbell’s story world method. This resulted in 3 women sewing clothes that are sold using a well branded online store. A sample from the store’s target group were invited to participate in several participatory design workshops to create the chosen products. This action research draws attention to the impact of community centric design on socio-economic status in informal areas.