Programme 01 · For schools

Kalakar City Lab

A 9 day programme for high-school students: research your own city’s culture, history, crafts and communities, then curate a one-day festival for your peers. Built in Agra, the framework adapts to any city.

01

Week 1 — Prepare

Digital sessions before arrival cover the city's history, design, architecture, storytelling and cultural landscape, preparing students for what they'll encounter on the ground.

02

Week 2 — Discover

Heritage walks, conversations with artists and craftspeople, design observation, storytelling sessions and community engagement — with Kala Kutir as the students' studio.

03

Week 3 — Create & Celebrate

Students shift from learners to creators, designing and producing a one-day festival for fellow students, teachers, families and the local community.

Programme 02 · Universities & gap-year

Kalakar Immersion Lab

A multi-city residency for MBA, design and gap-year students — learning marketing, culture and community directly from artists and cultural entrepreneurs. The one-month format runs across Panjim, Agra and Kullu after a week of campus preparation; the seven-month format adds Santiniketan and a deeper immersion in each city.

01

Campus preparation

One to two weeks of marketing, branding, consumer behaviour, cultural entrepreneurship, storytelling and experience design. Students form interdisciplinary teams and begin their research.

02

Three cities, three immersions

Panjim for tourism and the creative economy, Agra for heritage and craft, Kullu for nature and rural artisans — each city ending in a mini-festival made with the people students meet.

03

The Kalakar Festival

Students become creators — conceptualising and producing a public festival that celebrates the artists and communities they worked with. Designed by students, with artists, for the community.

Programme 03 · Universities

Agra Arts Festival Co-Creation Lab

Two weeks of digital preparation, then two weeks in Agra co-creating the Agra Arts Festival alongside local artists, artisans and communities. Students work in interdisciplinary teams — outreach, storytelling, experience design, curation, production, finance and hospitality — around one challenge: how do we reimagine Agra beyond the Taj Mahal while creating real opportunities for its artists and communities?

01

Prepare & read the city

Online sessions on Agra’s history, artists and neighbourhoods set teams and roles. Students then arrive and experience the city as researchers — walks, markets, food, craft, everyday life — documenting the stories that could shape the festival.

02

Research, prototype & build

Meeting artists and communities, turning research into festival ideas, and testing prototypes for workshops, performances, walks and installations while working on programming, budgets and audience journeys.

03

Activate & the festival

The festival goes public — content, posters, PR, partnerships and pop-up pre-events — leading to a two-day, student-produced cultural festival in Agra, closing with a day of collective reflection.

Custom & university immersion

Shorter and longer formats built with schools, universities and cultural institutions — around design, culture, place and creative practice. Semester-abroad, study tours and corporate learning included.

Who it’s for

School students, MBA and design students, gap-year and semester-abroad groups, and design or humanities departments looking for fieldwork that isn’t a case study.

What students build

Design thinking, cultural research, storytelling, event curation, communication, leadership and teamwork — plus a real public festival with their name on it. Aligned to UNESCO SDG 11.

Custom & university immersion

Shorter and longer formats built with schools, universities and cultural institutions — around design, culture, place and creative practice. Semester-abroad, study tours and corporate learning included.

Who it’s for

School students, MBA and design students, gap-year and semester-abroad groups, and design or humanities departments looking for fieldwork that isn’t a case study.

What students build

Design thinking, cultural research, storytelling, event curation, communication, leadership and teamwork — plus a real public festival with their name on it. Aligned to UNESCO SDG 11.

Our Philosophy

What Kala Sangam believes about culture and place.

Bring a Lab to your school, university or city

We design programmes with schools, universities and cultural institutions — turning a city into a classroom, built around your goals. Not sure which format fits? Message us and we’ll shape the cities, the artists and the outcome around you.

Kala Kutir

Where the Labs are based

The Learning Labs are run from Kala Kutir, Kala Sangam’s studio and cultural space in Agra.