MEET THE SPEAKER
We spend enormous time designing spaces for children.
But how often do we stop to ask what those spaces actually feel like to a child?
A classroom can be beautiful and still feel restrictive.
A play area can be colourful and still leave little room for imagination.
A piece of furniture can look perfect in a drawing and feel completely wrong at a child’s scale.
The difference often lies in the details — what a child can reach, choose, move, change, discover and make their own.
This is the space of thinking that Medha Jalan brings to PULSE 2026.
Ar. Medha Jalan
Architect · Children’s Furniture & Toy Designer · Founder, My FUNiture Story · Co-Founder, My KIDchen Story
An architect with a Master’s in Designing for Kids and Toys, Medha brings together architecture, furniture, toys and childhood in her approach to design.
Through My FUNiture Story, which she founded, she works towards creating meaningful childhood environments and a wider ecosystem of designers, educators and creators working together.
Her practice asks us to reconsider the ordinary things surrounding a child.
A table is not just a table.
A room is not just a room.
A piece of furniture can change how a child moves through a space.
Design becomes part of the experience.
What Makes This Perspective Different?
Scale becomes experience.
How a child reaches, moves and navigates a space matters.
Furniture becomes an invitation.
It can encourage interaction, movement, imagination and participation.
Play becomes part of the environment.
Not an afterthought, but something that can influence how a space is experienced.
Choice becomes meaningful.
A little autonomy can change how children relate to their surroundings.
Design becomes a tool for childhood.
Not simply something that surrounds children, but something that can support how they grow.
Questions Worth Bringing to PULSE
What if the best learning space is not the one that tells children where to go?
What if it gives them reasons to explore?
What if furniture could encourage agency?
What if the environment itself could make children feel more capable?
Medha brings these possibilities into the conversation at PULSE 2026 — adding a child-centred dimension to the larger dialogue around culture, learning and environment.
Where Culture Meets Learning
PULSE 2026 brings together architects, educators, school leaders, designers and thinkers to examine how learning environments influence the experiences that happen within them.
Medha’s perspective reminds us that those experiences begin much earlier than a lesson.
They begin when a child enters the space.
PULSE 2026 | Where Culture Meets Learning
5–7 October 2026 | Sheraton Grand Palace, Indore
Come see the familiar differently.