This project explores the experience of street vending around the Kapaleeshwarar Temple in Chennai, India. It examines what makes the area so attractive to street vendors, despite the challenges they face, such as being repeatedly asked to move by the municipal corporation and the risk of being hit by vehicles. Through interviews with “informal” street vendors, semi-formal stores, large stores, pedestrians, temple priests and government officials, this study presents an experience of street-vending around the temple. Key themes that arise from the study are generational ties to the area, faith, and different relationships with the temple, the corporation and the other stores. Through appropriation of land, street vendors have been present in the area for generations and set up a system of land inheritance. The vendors place their faith in the deity Kapaleeshwarar to care for them. Vendors say that stability through designated spaces would improve their experience of the space, while the governing body proposes design and infrastructure solutions. The planner serves as a mediator of space and quality, bringing together communities' lived experiences while improving urban environments through infrastructure solutions and negotiating the usage of urban space.