By Recently, I was made aware of and responded to this series of threads on Twitter, that among my colleagues in the D.C. area, there’s a concern over how many practitioners of place, especially planners, exist in the metro area and how many folks want to be planners by name, versus just
Why I’m Raising Money for The Black Urbanist and Why I’m Doing it On Patreon
I am raising money to make this the online home I’ve always dreamed it could be and needs to become. I’m doing it through Patreon because Patreon makes it easier for me to see what I have to work with each month and it’s optimized for people who write and make
Building on Theories and Practice of Black Urbanism in Our New World
I have always owed a great debt to the work of Sara Zewde, especially the usage of the term black urbanist and talking about black urbanism. Zewde is currently a principal at Asakura Robinson a designer at the Seattle-based firm GGN and in 2010, published her MIT graduate thesis, Theory, place, and
Six Things to Do When You Present Your Work
Conference season is upon us. Or it’s not a conference you have to present at, you need to get something built and you need city approval to do so. Unlike in years past, you’ve been asked by someone (your office, your vision board, your professor), to make a presentation. Don’t
Three Lessons I Learned About Place in 2015
I learned a lot about place this year. Yet, those many lessons coalesced into these three big lessons: a progressive, inclusive, tactical charrette process, people over money and the need to legally live in more than one place, to help you guys out there learn more about your own towns
Why Feelings Matter Most with Citizens and Their Cities
Design can’t be everything. Ask your kid who goes to Disney World and doesn’t like Mickey or Cinderella Castle. All they want to do is ride Space Mountain a bunch of times. That’s right. They’d rather go on a ride that strips away your sense of knowing where you are
The Game of Life Plans (and City Planning)
Lately I’ve been playing a ton of board games and doing puzzles. Granted, who hasn’t received a note from a friend asking them to play some sort of online puzzle game on Facebook. And yes, you can politely say no. Unless you see some benefit, like I did back a
And Now, My Book, A Black Urbanist, Essays Vol. 1
After several years of writing, two months of editing and final writing and several bouts of fear and confidence, my first blog-related, adult book, A Black Urbanist, is now available for your purchase. It is available in the following formats: Print— you want me to sign it and hold it in your
