Sensory-Friendly Interior for a 60-Child Urban Anganwadi-cum-Crèche in Bengaluru

This M.Des degree project redesigns the interior of a 60-child anganwadi-cum-crèche run by a fictional Bengaluru trust, Nanna Angala Child Care Trust, in a rented 210 m² ground floor of a residential building in a dense ward. Like many urban centres, it serves children from six months to six years whose parents work in garment units and domestic service. The space was never designed for children: one long hall with hard tile floors, a single tube-light grid, a TV on the wall, and noise that climbs past conversation level whenever more than twenty children are inside.

The project asks how interior design — zoning, acoustics, light, colour, texture and furniture sized for small bodies — can make such a space calmer and easier to run. It treats sensory comfort as a design problem: separating loud and quiet activities, giving infants a protected nap corner, reducing glare and echo, and providing sensory-regulation niches for children who are overwhelmed.

The work follows the degree-project process: observation and behaviour mapping over two weeks, interviews with anganwadi workers, helpers and parents, child anthropometric data, a design brief, zoning iterations, a material, colour and acoustic strategy, detailed drawings in AutoCAD, a 3D model in SketchUp with Enscape renders, furniture details, and a full-scale mock-up tested with the staff. Compliance with NBC 2016 Part 4 (fire and life safety) and the MoHUA Harmonised Guidelines for Universal Accessibility 2021 is checked throughout. Deliverables are a process document, a portfolio and a jury presentation.

Abstract

Urban anganwadis and crèches often operate in leftover spaces — rented halls, shop fronts, community-building ground floors — that were designed for adults. Hard surfaces amplify noise, a single light grid causes glare, storage is missing and everything happens in one room. Young children are highly sensitive to such environments, and staff spend their day managing noise rather than caring. This degree project designs a sensory-friendly interior for a 60-child anganwadi-cum-crèche in Bengaluru using low-cost, locally available materials that a small trust can maintain.

Introduction

The client (a fictional trust modelled on real neighbourhood childcare providers) runs the centre from 8 am to 6 pm with two anganwadi workers, three helpers and a cook. The ground floor has a hall, two small rooms, a kitchen, one toilet block and a 3 m deep front verandah facing a lane. Children arrive in shifts, eat two meals, nap after lunch and play indoors because there is no yard.

Research gap

There is detailed guidance on the programme of anganwadis from the Ministry of Women and Child Development and plenty of literature on sensory design for early childhood and for autistic children, but little that translates it into affordable interior interventions for rented urban centres in India, where walls cannot be moved, budgets are small and cleaning happens with water and phenyl every day.

Existing vs proposed

• Existing: one open hall used for everything; ceramic tile floor and plastered walls with high reverberation; uniform overhead tube lights; open shelves at adult height; infants sleep on mats in the same hall where older children play.
• Proposed: four clear zones (arrival, active play, quiet learning, infant care and nap) defined by furniture and floor finish rather than walls; acoustic ceiling panels and fabric baffles; warm, dimmable lighting with daylight from the verandah; low storage that children can reach; two calm niches for self-regulation; washable, rounded furniture sized from child anthropometric data.

Feasibility

• Technical: interventions are non-structural and reversible (the space is rented); materials include jute, cork, wood-wool acoustic boards, marine plywood and natural-finish linoleum.
• Economic: a phased bill of quantities lets the trust implement zoning and acoustics first.
• Operational: every finish is checked against the daily wet-cleaning routine and the workers' ability to supervise all zones from one point.

The Nanna Angala centre looks after sixty children aged six months to six years in a single rented hall with hard, echoing surfaces, glaring overhead lights and no separation between infants trying to sleep and older children playing. Workers report that noise peaks after breakfast and before pick-up, that infants wake repeatedly during the afternoon nap, and that a few children regularly become distressed and have nowhere to calm down. Storage is at adult height, so children depend on staff for every toy, and furniture sized for adults creates falls and cramped postures.

The problem this project addresses is: how can the interior of a rented, fixed-shell urban childcare centre be redesigned — using zoning, acoustics, lighting, colour, texture and child-scaled furniture — to reduce sensory overload for children and supervision load for staff, within a small trust's budget and daily cleaning regime, while meeting fire-safety and accessibility requirements? The answer must be demonstrated through observation evidence, iterated drawings and a tested mock-up.

In scope

• Interior design of the 210 m² ground floor: hall, two rooms, kitchen interface, toilet block fit-out and front verandah.
• Zoning, furniture layout, reflected ceiling plan, lighting, acoustic treatment, finishes, colour, signage and storage.
• Detailed design of six furniture pieces (low table, stackable stool, cubby storage, infant cot, reading nook, calm niche).
• Full-scale mock-ups of the calm niche and cubby storage.
• Phased cost estimate.

Out of scope

• Structural or façade changes (the building is rented).
• Kitchen equipment design beyond the serving counter.
• Curriculum or activity planning, which remains with the trust.

The project follows a human-centred design process — research, synthesis, ideation, iteration, validation — over 20 weeks, with guide reviews every two weeks and two stage juries.

Ethics: observation is non-intrusive, no children's faces appear in the document, parents and the trust give written consent, and the child's own preference is respected during mock-up testing.