Dubai Design Week is a global platform with a strong emphasis on cross-cultural exchange and amplifying voices from West and South Asia, as well as the wider Global South. It brings together designers and creative practitioners to exchange ideas, collaborate and explore the evolving role of design in shaping a better collective future. It offers a rich and varied programme that speaks to multiple audiences, the festival features installations, new commissions, exhibitions, talks, workshops, a marketplace, the leading fair for contemporary design, Downtown Design and the Middle East's first limited-edition art and design fair, Editions. 

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Baori, which was first showcased at Dubai Design Week 2024, was developed under the Coded Lines Collective. It began as a collaborative initiative between The Company of Design from Surat, Anuvad Innovation Studio from Ahmedabad, and When a Line from Mumbai. Rooted in a shared vision, the project emerged from a collective intent to explore design and innovation through a cooperative, interdisciplinary approach. 

The stepwell aka vav, Baori has existed in India since the Indus Valley Civilisation. From being crude trenches, to examples of ingenious engineering, they played an integral part of the daily life, until their purpose was replaced by the British ‘pipe and pump system’ in the 19th Century. Stepwells served not just as primary sources of ground water for daily use and droughts, but also as spaces for festivities and rituals. These structures were designed as gender neutral public spaces, playing a vital role in facilitating safe exchanges of knowledge, ideas and traditions especially in the female community, hence becoming sacred spaces of social, cultural significance. 
 
The Baori, envisioned as a multi-sensorial and immersive installation aspires to be a catalyst, by triggering senses of sight, sound and touch when one interacts with each facet depicting different aspects of a stepwell throughout history, and thus instilling shared moments of community interaction, exploration, contemplation and reflection like a Stepwell.