Gaurang Khemka

Biography: Gaurang Khemka is an architect with a specialization in Urban Design, Urban Hotels and Resort Planning. He has over 27 years of experience working in North America, Europe and Asia and has worked across a range of scales and contexts, from master planning and programming public institutions to detailed design of high end resorts and residences. He understands the essence of place making and the qualities that create some of the world’s finest institutional, hospitality, commercial and residential projects and combines that with his management skills to deliver a product of the highest quality. Gaurang has studied Architecture, Urban Design and Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. and has worked with reputed architects and urban design firms such as Charles Correa (Mumbai), Kerry Hill Architects (Singapore), EDAW Inc (San Francisco) and HOK Inc (Hong Kong, Singapore and Brisbane). He is an active member of several professional organizations globally such as AIA, APA, IIA, ULI, and SPUR and also sits on the board for ULI South Asia. He has also been a visiting critic at UC Berkeley and teaches at the National University of Singapore. Most recently, he started the office for HOK Inc in Singapore and was instrumental in building the Singapore and South Asia Practice for HOK after which he also built the South Asia practice for HOK Sport (now POPULOUS). He started his own firm URBNarc in 2011 and the firm has in a very short time managed to complete a few award-winning projects, namely: Alila Seminyak - a luxury beach resort in Bali, Naumi Liora- a heritage hotel in Singapore, and Indian Heritage Centre in Singapore. The firm also has exciting global projects on the drawing board. He is also an active philanthropist and sits on the Board for STEP (www.step.org) and also advises regularly to Street Child Project/ I-India (www.i-indiaonline.com). He is very passionate about cities and is an ide