From Vietnam’s Mekong Delta to Bangkok’s Historic Canals: How Studio Collaborations Are Reshaping Urban Design Practice
Beyond racial, economic, and cultural differences, there are certain commonalities that weave together Kerala and Southeast Asia. The most compelling of these is geography and climate. Sharing the tropical climatic zone, the region demonstrates how this environmental reality exercises influence on food, dressing, rituals, and critically, on how cities develop and integrate with water systems. It is this shared understanding that sparked an ambitious collaborative project bringing together architecture studios across borders to study, learn, and ultimately reimagine urban spaces.
For two successive years, the Bachelor of Architecture program at KMEA College of Architecture, Cochin undertook international studio collaborations that would fundamentally shift how its students approach urban design. In 2024, the studio traveled to Vietnam, where it partnered with faculty and students from Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and Education (HCCMUTE) to explore the theme of “Water Urbanism.” A year later, in 2025, the collaborative model evolved, with studios moving to Bangkok along with King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi – KMUTT, to investigate the intricate relationship between urban development and the city’s historic inland water canal systems.
But the impact of these international experiences didn’t end with overseas fieldwork. Armed with insights from Vietnam and Bangkok, students returned home to Cochin to apply what they had learned to their own city’s pressing urban challenges. What emerged was not merely academic exercises, but design proposals grounded in participatory approaches that engaged the public, invited dialogue, and challenged conventional thinking about water and urban space.
A Journey Begins: Water Urbanism in Can Tho, Vietnam (2024)
When the studio arrived in Ho Chi Minh City in 2024, it was with a clear focus: to understand how water shapes cities and how cities, in turn, shape their relationship with water. The focus of study was Can Tho, a major city in the Mekong Delta where the relationship between urban development and water systems is not merely a design concern—it is existential.
Working alongside faculty and students from HCCMUTE, the collaborative teams conducted extensive fieldwork, mapping canal systems, documenting informal settlements, analyzing flooding patterns, and exploring how traditional water-based livelihoods were adapting to modern urban pressures. The theme of “Water Urbanism” became more than an academic exercise; it was a lens through which students could examine equity, resilience, sustainability, and community in rapidly urbanizing spaces.
The studio prompted critical questions: How can cities preserve their relationship with water while accommodating growth? What roles can water systems play in public life? How do informal communities that depend on water systems factor into formal planning processes? These weren’t merely theoretical inquiries—they were rooted in the realities students witnessed daily.
Building on Success: Bangkok’s Waterways Reveal New Dimensions (2025)
A year later, when the studio reconvened in 2025, it moved to Bangkok with evolved objectives and deepened expertise. While Can Tho had centered on questions of water and rapid urbanization in a river delta city, Bangkok presented a different but equally compelling case study: a sprawling metropolis where water canals—both ancient and modern—are interwoven into the urban fabric in ways that reveal centuries of adaptive urban design.
Students engaged with the city’s inland water canal systems, studying how these khlong networks functioned historically and how they continue to evolve today. The focus shifted to understanding incremental urban development around these waterways, observing how communities adapt spaces, how informal economic activity thrives along canal banks, and how contemporary urban development either integrates or ignores these water networks.
The Bangkok studio became a masterclass in reading existing urban patterns. Students documented the relationship between formal urban planning and the organic, self-organized development that characterizes much of the city. They studied how public space emerges, how mixed-use neighborhoods function, and how historical precedents could inform contemporary design thinking.
More importantly, the Bangkok experience provided a counterpoint to Vietnam. While Can Tho represents a city grappling with urgent water-related challenges, Bangkok offered insights into how cities accommodate growth while maintaining complex relationships with water over extended time periods.
Bringing the World Home: Water Design and Public Engagement in Cochin
The true measure of an educational collaboration, however, lies not in the destinations visited but in what students carry forward. Upon their return, the students faced a pressing question: How do we apply these international perspectives to our own city?
Cochin, with its own complex relationship to water—characterized by its historic waterfronts, Chinese fishing nets, backwaters, and evolving urban canals—became the living laboratory for this transfer of knowledge. Students identified waterfronts and canal systems within the city that demanded design attention, whether for environmental remediation, public accessibility, economic activation, or community benefit.
But here is where the studio took a decisive turn. Rather than producing designs destined for a classroom portfolio or academic presentation alone, the students committed to participatory urban design methodologies. Design proposals were not created for the community; they were created with the community.
This meant organizing public workshops, conducting community consultations, presenting preliminary ideas to local stakeholders, and genuinely incorporating feedback into design iterations. Students learned that urban design is not a top-down prescription but a negotiation between professional expertise and community knowledge. Residents shared their lived experience of these spaces—their aspirations, concerns, and ideas for improvement.
The public presentations became more than exhibitions. They were forums for dialogue. Architects listened as residents articulated their needs. Communities saw their voices reflected in updated design proposals. Local authorities gained insights into grassroots perspectives on urban development.