IN-PERSON ISTANBUL HERITAGE(S)

Abstract

The historic urban cores of Karachi, Kharadar and Mithadar, provide an opportunity to examine urban transformations where everyday vernacular urbanisms (Jugaads) have developed in response to dense spatial constraints and a paradoxical water crisis. Karachi witnesses both rising floodwaters inundating its streets during monsoons while simultaneously lacking adequate potable water infrastructure for its inhabitants. This dual crisis makes the abundance of sabeels (drinking water fountains) particularly significant as sacred interventions addressing immediate survival needs. Dilapidated British colonial buildings are continuously renegotiated through layers of social, religious, and economic adaptation. This paper examines two parallel phenomena: the proliferation of ‘pocket mosques’ and sabeels as expressions of sacred vernacular attempting to quench the thirst of a parched city drowning in its own drainage failures, and the evolving materiality of vanishing colonial-era buildings as sites of contested heritage and adaptive reuse by street vendors. Understanding these small-scale interventions highlights a spatial morphology suturing necessity and sacred desires within growing urban densification. The informal transformation of dilapidated colonial buildings by street vendors questions traditional attitudes of pristine preservation. Through observational notes and layered visual analysis, this paper evaluates a Jugaad approach to preservation that recognizes incremental adaptations as reparative heritage practices rather than informal encroachments.