Chandigarh India Meeting, February 2024

During his stay in Chandigarh, an ideal city built by the famous architect Le Corbusier, the CEO of Ideal Spaces Foundation, Dr. Ulrich Gehmann, was invited for several meetings by Loveneet Thakur of the High Court Chandigarh and colleagues. Discussed was the present situation of the city, the need for providing additional housing for an ever-increasing number of inhabitants, and the problems caused by the housing provided today, taking the shape of new suburbs.

In the photo, Dr. Gehmann is being offered a gift of Le Corbusier’s famous hand, symbol of the ideal city of Chandigarh. 

During Dr. Gehmann’s meetings in Chandigarh, he was shown the location where Le Corbusier started to plan the original city, the interior of the original cafe designed by him, and several of his buildings. In the coming weeks, you will be able to find a series of photos from the trip to India on the Ideal Spaces Facebook site, including Chandigarh; a further series will be found at www.idealspaces.org, in the News & Events section.   

Dr. Gehmann also met with a number of interesting and influential people, including a local investor,Mr. Manpreet Singh; a member of a NGO involved in the new suburbs,Mr. Satnam Singh; and a physician, Dr. Amit Gupta, active in health consequences of the new suburbs.  

The people of Chandigarh have proposed mutual activities for the future, such as a common symposium relative to the future of housing and lifestyle in modern day India.