Look around in your city.
What do you see?
Are people happy?
Do they have a place to live? All of them?
Are animals and birds happy? Do they have clean air to breathe and water to drink?
And what about trees and plants? How do they feel in your city?
Look around. Observe. Listen.
Happiness City is a manifesto disguised as a poem to create gentle cities that belong to all. It is an invitation to examine the state of our cities and collectively dream and design for a better tomorrow. It challenges the norm of cities being made with expertise and dares to reimagine the act of city-making with crayons and dignity for all. It hopes to ignite curiosity in both children and adults to question the everyday struggle and suffering that cities have come to be known for, and reimagine our collective urban futures.
About the Author
Bhawna Jaimini is an urban practitioner, writer, and mother of two cats. She received the Chevening scholarship in 2023 to pursue a master’s in Sustainable Cities at King’s College London and is currently setting up the Centre for Urban Commons, a platform dedicated to creating more shared public spaces in Indian cities. She tries hard to balance cynicism with hope in her practice, and her book, Happiness City is a culmination of that struggle.
About the Illustrator
Deepa Balsavar has written and illustrated more than thirty books for children. As a consultant with UNICEF on the Meena Project in South Asia, Balsavar wrote scripts and trained animation houses in Bangladesh. She has also developed communication material on HIV/AIDS, sexuality and gender education, mental health, and women’s studies. Deepa’s illustrations for this book are a bit like the concept of Happiness City itself. Using collage work, watercolours, transparent inks and crayons, each image was layered to form the final pictures.
About the Publisher
The People Place Project is an initiative dedicated to raising awareness about our environment, communities and places through research, publications and pedagogy. Spearheaded by Nisha Nair Gupta, it encourages and creates meaningful conversations to deepen our understanding of places and communities through the lens of ‘people’ and ‘empathy’.
The illustrated books published by The People Place Project such as the City Mosaic series, Paani Party, and Batata, Pao, and All Things Portuguese, explore the understanding of the built environment and urban living through art. Happiness City continues this pursuit, by being an important instrument to open a discussion about whom we imagine cities for.
Book Details:
Authors: Bhawna Jaimini
Illustrator: Deepa Balsavar
Publisher: People Place Project
Published on: 24 November 2024
ASIN: B0DP1LKC25
No. of Pages: 32
Purchase Details: Amazon
