Navya Balakrishnan is an Indian interior architect and industrial designer. Her work investigates how people inhabit and navigate spaces, exploring the social fabric of architecture.
After graduating as an industrial designer from the University of Petroleum & Energy Studies (Dehradun) in 2021, Navya pursued her interest in furniture design at the Delhi-based design studio Project810. There, she gained hands-on experience in furniture production and contributed to various residential and retail projects. Building on this foundation, she went on to join the Master of Arts in Interior Architecture (MAIA) program at HEAD – Genève, where she continued to develop her interdisciplinary approach to spatial and object design.
Diploma Project
Choreographies of the In-Between
Set in New Delhi, this diploma project explores the assimilation of the diverse demographics that inhabit high-income group housing—residents, staff, children, and service providers. It seeks to foster this integration through spatial strategies centered around corridors.
The project builds upon the historical evolution of residential architecture in the city, from the inward-facing courtyards of vernacular havelis to the socially cohesive mohallas that emerged through clustering. These spatial logics, as interpreted by architect Raj Rewal as the “theater of the street,” foreground the role of circulation as a site of social life.
Drawing from these precedents, the proposal reintroduces interconnected blocks and communal pockets within the framework of high-rise housing. These are designed to support everyday domestic practices—rest, play, work, and celebration—while enabling overlaps and intimate pockets altogether. Through this, the project questions contemporary hierarchies of access and proposes an alternative spatial programmation grounded in permeability, empathy, and shared inhabitation.
