Belaku: Designing Light With Craft, Community, and Possibility

Belaku is a lighting design project where material intelligence, craft, and social purpose converge. Conceived by Tacit in collaboration with Chetana—an occupational and rehabilitation organisation in Sirsi, Karnataka—the project designs meaningful products that empower artisans, celebrate sustainable materials, and create new pathways into contemporary markets.

Lighting Design with Banana Fibre

Chetana Foundation: Purpose rooted in dignity and craft

Chetana is an initiative of the Prashanti Foundation that works with differently-abled adults, offering vocational training, economic support, and psycho-social care so they can lead dignified, purposeful lives. Originally begun to engage people with intellectual disabilities in meaningful activity, the centre now supports dozens of artisans who create products from sustainable and natural materials like banana fibre—a biodegradable, eco-friendly fibre extracted from banana plant stems. The Better India+1

Far more than a production centre, Chetana functions as a community space where skills, confidence, and livelihood intersect. The artisans work with local women volunteers and trainers who help them not only learn craft techniques but also grow socially and economically. Over many years, the organisation has developed a range of products—bags, boxes, stationery, decor items and more—crafted from banana fibre and recycled materials.

Material as message: banana fibre at the heart of Belaku

Banana fibre is a remarkable material: strong, biodegradable, and derived from agricultural by-products that would otherwise go to waste. It has a rich texture and sustainability story, making it ideal for artisanal products with contemporary relevance.

Rather than imposing forms from outside, Tacit’s design process began by exploring how banana fibre behaves with light and structure. The natural qualities of the fibre—its texture, flexibility, and surface energy—became the starting pointsfor lighting design solutions that feel both crafted and contemporary.

Co-creation with Chetana artisans

Belaku isn’t a designer-dictated object; it’s a collaborative outcome. The design process involved iterative dialogue with Chetana’s craftsmen and trainers, testing shapes, refining techniques, and understanding what makes production viable and satisfying for makers. This co-creative dynamic ensured the products were expressive yet practical and could be produced sustainably at scale.

Guiding practice: mentorship and context-sensitive learning

An important chapter in Belaku’s story is Tacit’s mentorship of industrial design intern Kedar Joshi, from Jönköping University in Sweden. As a summer intern, Kedar didn’t just sketch concepts—he immersed himself in context, spending time with the artisans to understand their distinct needs: abilities, institutional infrastructure, material handling constraints, and production workflows.

This hands-on engagement exemplifies what true contextual design entails: seeing constraints not as limitations but as design inputs that shape more empathetic, feasible solutions. The knowledge Kedar gained from this experience directly influenced how the lighting solutions were conceived and refined.

Form, function, and identity

The final Belaku lighting pieces celebrate simplicity and texture. With sculptural silhouettes that play with light and shadow, the lamps become focal points in a space—objects that animate their surroundings rather than merely illuminatethem. Each piece carries the unique character of its maker and the material’s natural beauty.

Markets, impact, and sustainability

Belaku is more than a product line; it’s a design intervention with tangible social impact. By creating objects that resonate with contemporary tastes while grounding them in artisanal craft, the project helps open new market opportunities for Chetana’s artisans. This approach transforms craft from a charitable activity into a sustainable enterprise, giving makers agency, visibility, and economic independence.

Belaku tries to see how design can do more than shape objects: it can create pathways to dignity, sustainability, and community well-being—one handcrafted piece of light at a time.

Link to Project Page