Peter Krige

By 2030 the global slum population will double to two billion. How can we alter this world-scale urbanisation of poverty?

Slum transition describes the process of transformation from the current state or urbanised poverty to a low carbon and resilient future state within urban slums. Through the tools of collaborative design and co-visioning with stakeholders and residents it redirects slums away from adopting unsustainable infrastructure towards leading and defining the way to improved quality of life and local resilience.

'Ekasi' is a design-led organisation that embodies the ideas and methods of slum transition. Human-centred design and collaborative workshops are tools used in this process. Its first workshop with partners of Imizamo Yethu Township in South Africa focused on heating and handling water in the home.

There, water is limited and once collected is stored and transferred between plastic containers: a resourceful way to deal with a lack of formal infrastructure. The water is then heated using kettles or in large pots on the stove to wash, bath and do laundry.

The workshop outcomes were developed into final designs in London. Key elements were made into products. These key parts, once combined with locally producible designs, allow an inaccessible product to be fabricated within a small workshop in the township - ready for sale and installation.

These new product systems, a solar thermal heater, water unit and pressurised shower, work with the existing product ecology and represent a launch proposition to experiment and collaborate in this space.