Shade and the Urban

In urban India, the street is used as a ‘public space’ more than the park, the playground or a mall. In most parts of the country, for several months in the year, the weather is extremely warm and as people engage in everyday practices on the streets, they seek protection from the sun. Often, a large canopied tree becomes the popular choice for a bus-stop, a place of gathering or a clustering of vendors. 

 

In this SHADE mapping project, we have been mapping the social, cultural and economic  activities of different users such as local residents, street vendors, the elderly, women and children with respect to how shade helps them on an everyday basis. The cities that our team has so far worked in include Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Bangalore, Dehradun and Kolkata. Each team member identified shade-giving trees in their own neighbourhoods or in areas that they visited regularly within their own cities.

 

The themes that have emerged are: Shade and social interaction, Shade and place-making, Shade and memory, Trees as anchors, Shade and tree worship and Shade and well-being. 

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Click on the themes below to discover what our studies reveal about shade and the urban!