On Havelis of Lahore / Rabeeya Arif

Architecture Off-Centre

“There is this informal inhabitation of spaces of heritage within the walled city that actually subverted the original intent of the buildings, however, they helped in the social economic development of the spaces that were being inhabited.”

The exodus that followed the partition of India and Pakistan in 1947 caused one of the largest human migrations in the world and resulted in the mass abandonment of private property and structures of cultural heritage. In the walled city of Lahore, Hindu temples and Sikh havelis are being inhabited by low-income and marginalized communities as informal settlements – leading to what one may call “accidental preservation”.

Rabeeya Arif works on urban and disaster risk management at the World Bank on issues ranging from post-conflict housing reconstruction in Beirut to urbanization in Mauritania. She is a graduate of the Master of Science in Architecture Studies program at MIT and has previously worked as a conservationist with the Aga Khan Trust for Culture in Lahore.

Rabeeya’s thesis: https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/123576