26/12/2021
It started in 2014; I was in my final year of architecture interning at Laurent Lim Architects, Kuala Lumpur.
And although the idea of building a platform for architects and students to share knowledge & collaborate - was in my head since 2012, it then felt like I was not solving a more significant problem.
Hence, while working as an intern in KL, I started to understand the gap between the architects and clients - and how architects can only provide their services to specific locations in the era where the internet is making things global!
So, after finishing my internship, when I returned to India - I felt very strongly to solve this and building a strong collaborative community.
To get started, without much fear of what the future holds - I started a FB page with the name sqrfactor. I started posting relevant content (quotes, facts, fun things) every day and almost after 5 months of starting it, around May 2015, we had a strong community of 3,000+ members engaging with content each day.
But the idea was to solve the problem of bridging the gap between architects/designers and the client.
After researching & brainstorming a lot, I had to develop an easy idea to test waters. And hence, the concept of connecting architects & students with Government & Businesses through design competition was born!
Before moving online, I, along with my friends (whom I had to convince to experiment with something new), started running offline competitions, taking small projects from Municipal Corporations, and floating them in local colleges.
The first picture is from our first offline NASA event at Indore where we went to talk about our first contest, “Reinventing Gwalior”
The 2nd and 3rd pictures are from the Event of our 1st online architectural contest by GMC with the same name, “Reinventing Gwalior’16”
The last picture is of the team celebrating our platform feature launch in Bangalore in 2016.
More stories of the journey coming soon.
