UnBox is a festival celebrating action at the intersection of multiple disciplines. It is an attempt on the part of the Box collective to build momentum around design thinking and interdisciplinary collaborations as the means of driving more sustainable and impactive social, cultural and business innovation in India.

1. A Festival of
Action at the
Intersections
www.unboxfestival.com
Supported by:

2. UnBox IS A FESTIVAL CELEBRATING ACTION AT THE
INTERSECTIONS OF DIFFERENT DISCIPLINES. IT IS AN
ATTEMPT TO BUILD MOMENTUM AROUND DESIGN THINKING
AND INTER-DISCIPLINARY COLLABORATIONS AS THE
MEANS OF DRIVING MORE SUSTAINABLE AND IMPACTIVE
SOCIAL AND CULTURAL CHANGE IN INDIA.
THE FESTIVAL BLENDS WORK AND PLAY ACROSS
CONTEXTS AND MEDIUMS, BRINGING ATTENDEES
TOGETHER FOR WORKSHOPS, DEBATES, BRAINSTORMS,
PICNICS, LITERARY READINGS AND TRAVEL. TOGETHER,
WE’LL RETHINK AND STRETCH DESIGN PRACTICE. UNBOX
CREATES A SPACE FOR PRACTITIONERS TO LEARN FROM
ONE ANOTHER AND SPARK NEW FORMS OF SOCIAL AND
CULTURAL INNOVATION.
ORGANIZERS > THE BOX COLLECTIVE
UnBox is the culmination of efforts of four successful Indian creative practices that
have exemplified the value of inter-disciplinary collaborations as the means of driving
impact and change. Together these studios form the The Box Collective:
» Quicksand (www.quicksand.co.in) : A multi-disciplinary innovation consultancy
based in Delhi & Bangalore in India.
» Codesign (www.codesign.in) : A multi-faceted branding, and communication design
practice.
» Basic Love of Things - B.L.O.T. (www.blottin.blogspot.com) : An electronic music
and visual arts collective bringing the Basic Love of Things to India and the world.
» BlindBoys (www.blindboys.org) : A photo commune.

3. UnBOX IS A TWO WEEK FESTIVAL CONSISTING OF:
FELLOWSHIPS CONFERENCE PUBLIC EVENTS
UnBox FELLOWSHIP: Intensive, multi- AUDIENCE
day travel workshops for accomplished Our audience is diverse, and includes
and emerging practitioners from fields of designers, entrepreneurs, educators,
design, business, art, social sciences and activists, and policy makers interested in
technology. Chosen fellows would travel interdisciplinary approaches to cultural
to different parts of the country to learn, intervention. We seek to bring together
inform and share the new contexts for both senior and emerging practitioners
social, cultural and business innovations. working in India, along with selected
Inaugural year themes include urban international attendees.
sanitation, safe water, organic food,
Old Delhi in new media, livelihoods in TENTATIVE VENUES
Kumaon and clean energy. » Alliance Française
Lodi Estate, New Delhi
UnBox CONFERENCE: Attendees will » Lokayata Gallery
kickoff 2 days with panels introducing Hauz Khas Village, New Delhi
and debating design, innovation, cultural » The Greenhouse
change, and alternative platforms for Hauz Khas Village, New Delhi
action. » Smaller studio venues distributed
across New Delhi & Gurgaon
UnBox PUBLIC EVENTS: Conference
attendees and the general public can UnBox WILL HAPPEN IN PARALLEL
join 3 afternoons of exhibitions, panels, WITH TECHNODROME, an arts and
skill shares, and performances in various music festival, and BEAT REPEAT, a
Delhi settings. Themes include book literary festival. Events among the three
making, social impact in education and festivals will be cross-promoted and
experiments with food. coordinated to allow UnBox festival
goers to intersect with these other
vibrant experiences.

4. SAMPLE PROGRAM
FEBURARY 2011 CONFERENCE EVENT FESTIVAL EVENT
PRE-FESTIVAL ● UnBox Fellowship Field Trips: Intensive, multi-day travel workshops for
accomplished and emerging practitioners. Inaugural year themes include
organic food in India, Old Delhi in new media, design entrepreneurship in
India, and livelihoods in Kumaon.
●I Small Books: A curated exhibition of independent book design and
publishing at Greenhouse, Hauz Khas Village.
THUR / 24 ● Exhibition—Indian Design at the Intersections begins and goes for two weeks
at Lokayata Gallery.
● Welcome Kick-off Party
● Beat Repeat, Technodrome: Cultural and Music experiences
FRI / 25 ● Design as a Cultural Force: MP Ranjan offers a historical perspective on
design as a force for cultural change in India, offering unusual paths into the
future.
● Creative Collectives Showcase: A curated showcase of Indian startups,
collectives, and individuals who offer innovative models and processes for
their unique contexts. These new, self-assured Indian collectives include
artists, educators, and entrepreneurs.
● Improvisation at the intersections: A theater workshop offers attendees a
space to sharpen their skills of expression, responsivity, and adaptation.
● Skill shares: A series of hands-on workshops where people can share specific
skills from across a number of disciplines.
● Beat Repeat, Technodrome: Cultural and Music experiences
SAT / 26 ● Alternative Design Platforms: Talk and panel curated by John Thackara on
how designers can work in new ways to meet the challenges of complexity,
global connection, and environmental degradation?
● Futureforms: Ten curated, 5-minute presentations of possible futures to
provoke and inspire attendees.
● Documenting Design: Handmade in India co-author Aditi Ranjan speaks
about the roles documentation can play in design work at the intersections of
government, industry, crafts, and art.
● Skill shares: A series of hands-on workshops where people can share specific
skills from across a number of disciplines.
● Beat Repeat, Technodrome: Cultural and Music experiences
SUN / 27 ● Make-a-thon: For conference goers inclined to tinker and hack, the UnBox
Make-a-thon is a collaborative, cross-platform space for innovative creation,
open to the public.
● Beat Repeat, Technodrome: Cultural and Music experiences
POST FESTIVAL ● Produce and disseminate documentation in form of a blog and limited-run
publication recording process and outcomes of all festival sessions.

5. CONFERENCE SPEAKERS
JOHN THACKARA: Described by Business Week as “one of the great voices
on sustainability,” Thackara is a writer, speaker, and founder-director of the
Doors of Perception conference. He is author of In the Bubble: Designing in
a Complex World (MIT Press).
M P RANJAN: M P Ranjan has been named amongst the top twenty
design thinkers of the world (Design Thinking Exchange). M P Ranjan is
an Independent academic from Ahmedabad. He is the author of the blog
Design for India, and the book Bamboo & Cane Crafts of Northeast India,
and co-editor of Handmade in India.
LAKSHMI MURTHY: Internationally awarded communication designer
Murthy has designed visuals sensitive to cultural and societal norms for
non-literate and low-literate audiences. She heads Vikalp Design, based in
Udaipur, Rajasthan, India.
ADITI RANJAN: Aditi Ranjan is a weaver, textile designer, and design
teacher at the National Institute of Design since 1972. Following her interests
in Craft, Culture and Design Research, she co-edited Handmade in India—
an encyclopedia of the handicrafts of India.
AYUSH CHAUHAN: Ayush Chauhan is the Founder & Director of Quicksand,
a multi-disciplinary innovation consultancy whose clients include Google,
IDEO, and Gates Foundation. An IIM-A graduate, with past experience in
brand & product management stint for Banking, Ayush is a firm believer
in cross-disciplinary collaborations as the means of doing meaningful and
impactful work
NICO MACDONALD: Nico Macdonald is a London based writer and
strategist focusing on innovation in the media sector. He conducted early
investigations into the emergence of interaction design for online media,
publishing in Eye, Blueprint, Creative Review, Design Week, PRINT and I.D.
magazine; co-programming the ground-breaking conferences Designing the
Internet (1996) and Design For Usability (2000); and authoring What is Web
Design? (RotoVision, 2003).
HARSH PUROHIT: Harsh Purohit, the Founder Director of Cognito, is a
sustainability strategist. He has developed the ‘4Ps of Sustainability - Profits,
Protests, Policies and Preservation’, a framework for helping diverse sections
of society understand sustainability, internalize it and implement it.

6. FELLOWSHIPS
Travel to different parts
of the country with multi-
disciplinary teams to learn,
inform and share the new
contexts for social, cultural
and business innovations.
ORGANIC FOOD IN INDIA: The growth of organic food is a global trend that is
slowly but surely finding its way into India. There is a nascent ecosystem of players in
India: farmers, consumers, retailers, health and policy experts who are involved in this
ecosystem. We hope to study this context through a multi-disciplinary lens and identify
opportunities for innovation—in order to get the organic food ecosystem to flourish
within India.
OLD DELHI > NEW MEDIA: This fellowship project is located within the spatial and
conceptual dimensions of Old Delhi and what was once the Walled City. This fellowship
project is an attempt to create new audiovisual content that expresses a compact
experience of this area through multiple forms of media, including a live performance.
LIVELIHOODS IN KUMAUN: Chirag (Central Himalayan Rural Action Group) is a rural
development organization based in the Kumaun region of Uttarakhand in India. The
fellowship project is an attempt to identify design intervention opportunities in Chirag’s
endeavor to provide livelihood, education, and health.
CLEAN ENERGY: This fellowship explores the fledgling landscape of clean & renewable
energy in India. It is an immersive 3-4 day trip that works with a green entrepreneur in
thinking through the challenges of their enterprise. Potential contexts include a biomass
plant in rural Bihar or an innovative LED lighting startup in Uttar Pradesh.
SAFE WATER: This fellowship explores new distribution models and product strategies
for providing safe access to clean drinking water. During this fellowship participants will
engage with a not-for-profit doing distribution pilots in rural Uttar Pradesh or a large
consumer durables company looking at base of the pyramid for product innovations in
the South.
URBAN SANITATION: This fellowship explores the transient state of urban slums in
India through the lens of water and sanitation. During this fellowship participants will
engage with a civil society or government agency as they work with the community in
understanding and providing water & sanitation services.

7. PERFORMING ARTISTS // TECHNODROME
» MARKUS DETMER » SILVER SEEDS » NUCLEYA
Germany Switzerland India
» TIMO REUBER » 4YOUREYE » KOHRA
Germany Austria India
» ANDY GUHL » B.L.O.T. » SATTYANANDA
Switzerland India India
CONTACT
Mr Ayush Chauhan
ayush@quicksand.co.in