Meet the Designer
Harmanjot
Kaur
Strategic Foresight and Innovation
“Harman is a multi-disciplinary designer with a diverse educational and cultural background. Through her varied personal and professional experiences, she has come to recognise that empathy transcends diversity. Thus, to her, designing solutions that resonate with people necessitates understanding of their history, story, and unique needs. She sincerely believes that design should be holistic, well researched, and mindful of not creating additional problems while solving one. She is a circular economy enthusiast and wants to have a positive impact on the world. Her interests lie at the nexus of sustainability, community resilience, and women empowerment.”
Her major research project seeks to address the wicked problem of menstrual waste, which is rapidly rising due to the use of disposable sanitary pads and the lack of proper waste management systems in India. The research explores cloth pads as a viable alternative to non biodegradable single-use sanitarypads. Further, it discusses what directed efforts can provide an impetus for the broad adoption of clothpads as a sustainable menstrual hygiene product. The project concludes with strategic recommendations fordeveloping a more holistic and sustainable approach towards menstrual health management,carefully addressing myths, beliefs, practices, systems, and environments in rural India.
National Institute of Design, India
Lifestyle and Accessory Design (MDes)
Major Completed, 2018
Research and Strategy Systems Design Foresight Design thinking Product Design Data Visualisation Prototyping Workshops and facilitation Storytelling