Elena Darjania was born in 1989. She studied at the Georgian Technical University from 2006 to 2012 and graduated with a Master of Architecture with Honors. Currently she is pursuing her doctoral studies at the department of Human Geography at Tbilisi State University. Elena’s research interests include housing and urban development in the post-soviet cities of South Caucasus.
Since 2012, Elena works with Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) as a project team assistant and is involved in developing social housing in Georgia.
The suggested research project “Illegal Acquisition of Land and squatters’ settlements in Tbilisi” aims to investigate the nature of informal settlements in Tbilisi and identify ways of its integration into urban structure of the city by means of spatial-territorial planning.

Research: A Tbilisi Pie - Illegal cutting of land plots and "squatter settlements" on the territory of Tbilisi