The Works · the third

UPAGP: a website built as a house

Families are known once, gatherings are booked in a minute, and the stories of home are kept.

4gatherings a year, each its own page
8regions of Uttar Pradesh, walked on a map
2languages, English and Hindi, in every room

Why it exists

Why does an association of families need a house, not a website?

Think of how a community usually keeps itself: a list of members in a spreadsheet, tickets on one site, photos in another, news in a group chat, and the stories of how it all began in a few people's memories. Each piece works. Nothing joins them, and a family new to the group meets a form, not a welcome.

UPAGP, the UP Association of Greater Philadelphia, has brought families from Uttar Pradesh and the lands around it together since 2001: for Diwali, for Holi, for a summer picnic, and for a meeting each January on Republic Day. Its board wanted one place where a family is known once, books a gathering in a minute, and finds the home it left waiting for it.

So I built them a house, with Claude.

What it does

What does the house do?

A visitor walks through rooms; a family that has come home finds its own; the board runs the year from a room of its own.

Knows each family onceA family comes home in seven short steps: who they are, their people, where in UP they come from, one memory. After that they sign in with a link by email, or a phone number and a birth date. No passwords.
Books a gathering in a minutePrices are worked out for each person's age on the day, member prices apply by themselves, and the ticket carries a code for the door. Who's coming fills up as bookings are paid.
Keeps the stories of homeUttar Pradesh region by region, with photographs; the association's years as a row of lamps; and the Web of Welcome, which shows which family brought which.
Carries the evening, and keeps itOn the night, a door app checks families in even without signal, and the hall screen lights a lamp as each family arrives. The next morning the same page shows who came, the photos and families' words.

The idea underneath

The idea underneath

We never left home. We carried it here.

The house is drawn as a home from Uttar Pradesh: a courtyard that follows Philadelphia's hour and season, an arched doorway at every crossing like the scalloped arches of Lucknow, a lamp in a niche. Every room is in English and Hindi. Real people's words are only ever their own: the founders, presidents and families speak or type them into the house, and nothing is written for them.

Where it stands

Where does it stand?

  • Built. Every room stands on a test address, with sample families, and is being walked by the people who will run it. They leave notes on the pages as they go.
  • Waiting for the move. Card payments and real email are built and switched off. They turn on when the house moves to the association's own address.

What is public. The house's rooms are open to anyone. A family's details are seen only by families who have come home and member families, and only what each family chooses to show. A gathering's page shows the names of the families coming, unless a family chooses to be counted without its name. These three pages name no one.

Go further

Three ways in

The guide · two minutesWhat it is, and how to use itThe rooms, in the order you would meet them, and what the house will and won't do. The System Book · fifteen minutesHow every part worksEach path through the house, step by step, and every part in plain words. The house itself · on its test addressWalk itThe real house, before it moves to upagp.com.