a “they really do it all” studio

navjot (pronounced nuhv-joh-th) heer is a first generation designer-artist-organizer with experience across mediums and disciplines. navi was born and raised in Central Valley of California and comes from a large, close-knit Panjabi Sikh family. her community who shaped her desire to bring culture, values, and history into everything she does. this upbringing continues to guide her, from undergrad architecture school to design work in the SF-Bay area, and the move to her current home in Chicago for deeper community-based work.

navi credits thier gemini rising for the endless side projects, creative experiments, love for collaboration, and expansiveness that allows for projects to become what they need to be. her work is grounded in themes of home-belonging, land-ritual, and relationships-resistance. naazuk is a design studio to home all these creative projects, collaborations, and experiments.

navi has contributed movement art and design work to spaces such as the Stop ShotSpotter campaign, Defund CPD campaign, Young Cultural Stewards, Chicago Community Bond Fund, Asian Americans Advancing Justice, Design as Protest Collective, Spirit of West Fresno oral history project, and more.   

navjot heer headshot

Photo by Maddie Neiconi / @somadds

naazuk means a lot of things

My whole life, my family has said “aapni navi tha bahut zada naazuk hai” (our navi is sooo naazuk) in so many different contexts. I looked up the definition a while back to explain to a friend and got everything from dangerous and frail to soft and troubling. It’s amazing how one word can carry so many meanings! And yes, naazuk does mean it all. Like my Beji always reminded me, being naazuk doesn’t mean weakness; there is so much strength inherent in that softness and tenderness and that is incredibly powerful. I love this and I love how english is too narrow of a language to really capture and translate all this word carries in panjabi. In my work and in life, I try to move with both tenderness and power in everything I do. I want this design studio to hold all these complexities and feelings, so naazuk is a pretty fitting name.

Let’s get chaa or coffee and I’ll tell you more!