desi-gned
Launching New England’s first publication for the South Asian diaspora to reimagine cultural storytelling for a new generation.
desi-gned (pronounced ‘designed’) is a living archive of ingenious craftsmanship, subaltern histories and current contemplations— untold ‘desi’ stories that need to be shared. Born atBrown University and Rhode Island School of Design, desi-gned brings untold stories of culture, design, and art from the South Asian subcontinent to the colonial world in the northeast of the United States.

Launched at RISD Museum, the first issue was launched in 2023, with a circulation of 800 physical and digital copies. The publication is, and always has been, free of any financial barriers for entry. Today, desi-gned is a part of many major collections including Providence Public Library, John Hay Library, and Thomas J. Watson Library at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.






“This publication is an excellent example of what can be accomplished by students working together with advisors and faculty to create a professional and well-researched publication that is a model for future endeavors.”

— Doug Scott

Senior Critic, Rhode Island School of Design
Senior Critic, Yale University School of Art







desi-gned centers native terminology—as a movement in the reclamation of the histories, traditions, and identities that have endured generations of erasure.

desi-gned acts on reviving print—and consider the contribution of physical knowledge archives in the persistence of information and memory in human spaces.

desi-gned subverts conventional methods of knowledge transmission—by providing more accessible, equitable, and sustainable means for knowing while promoting research on art and design spaces that live outside of the West.







The publication’s visual identity was developed with the designer to ensure it was rooted in South Asia’s rich cultural heritage while embodying a contemporary look to contextualize the collegiate spaces from which this work was developed.




The pattern is a marriage of the traditions of kolam (floor murals made using rice powder) from the South and jali (Arabic-inspired stone curtains that are carved into arches and windows) from the North.
The logotype maintains the minimalist and contemporary look of the publication through the use of a consistent typeface. It uses  the shirorekha (the upper horizontal line that joins composite characters) from the Devanagari script (which is widely used in South Asian languages).  

The graphic use of eight different stamps, one from each of the eight South Asian countries to represent different aspects of South Asia’s design culture, from architecture to flora and fauna. This graphic was used to provide a bold, yet fun visual identity to the publication—dismantling ideas of elitism and somberness associated with academic dossiers.







In 2024, the legacy of desi-gned was continued by the publications first ever team of creatives at Brown and RISD. The second issue brings reinterprets and recontextualizes latent stories that challenge existing notions. As we investigate both tangible objects and cultural histories, we consider what is, in fact, contemporary in South Asian stories.






The launch of desi-gned, at the RISD Museum, was attended by more than 200 members from the Brown and RISD communities. Each year, we reinstall a museum label intervention in the Grand Galleries of the Museum. (Re)Painting Histories, was developed with help from the Director of Museum Academic Programming Alexandra Poterack and Curator of Costume and Textiles Kate Irvin, to challenge narratives of European culture that are told without mention of their colonial origins.  


desi-gned, 2023

Personal Project, 100 weeks
Creative direction, editorial direction, content creation, brand strategy, publication management

Co-founded with Siddharth Thuppil
Created with Mehek Gopi Vohra


Issue 1, 2023
Issue 2, 2024
‘(Re)Painting Histories’ Site
Brown Daily Herald: Brown, RISD students launch New England’s first publication for South Asian diaspora
RISD News: SPUR-Funded RISD Student Research Advances Sustainability and Social Equity
Feature by RISD1877
Mention by President Williams


Images by Kaiolena Tacazon, Boris David Gramajo, Erik Gould