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  • What is Social Impact Design?
    • Overview
    • Most Urgent Questions
  • About the Foundation
    • Overview
    • Initiatives
      • Community Design Agency
    • People
    • Awards
      • Overview
      • Grantees
      • Curry Stone Design Prize Winners
      • Social Design Circle Honorees
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Urban Strategies

Here you’ll find practices that work at the urban scale. They combine architecture, planning and engineering to improve social, economic and environmental conditions within cities.

Related Keywords
  • Urban Strategies
  • Community Development
  • Community Engagement
  • Civic Empowerment
  • Advocacy
  • Architecture
  • Public Space
  • Education
  • Art Activism
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  • North America
  • Environmental Sustainability

04 | Engaging Community, Engaging Practice

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Should designers be outlaws? Arquitectura Expandida discusses its approach to working in informal communities alongside (and sometimes around) government.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

118 | Design Politics in the Climate Emergency

Podcast
Crisis in Climate, Crisis in Design Dr. Kian Goh, RA, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Urban Planning at UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs. She researches the relationships between urban ecological design, spatial politics, and social mobilization in the context of climate change and global urbanization.
  • Urban Strategies

12 | Why All Architecture is Social

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Can design challenge inequality? Giancarlo Mazzanti shares his thoughts on transforming Medellin and how great architecture can bring neighborhoods together.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

121 | Buildings Made of Sky

Podcast
Crisis in Climate, Crisis in Design Bruce King, PE, natural building advocate, joins us to discuss his new book “The New Carbon Architecture: Building to Cool the Planet”
  • Environment
  • Housing
  • Urban Strategies

24-25 | Tools for Urban Action, Part 1 & 2

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Can design reclaim public space? Ecosistema Urbano & Interboro share their stories about how they shaped a practice around public space.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

27-28 | How All Space Becomes Public Space, Part 1 & 2

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Can design reclaim public space? EXYZT and Basurama detail new ways to think about public space.
  • Urban Strategies

29-30 | The New Informal City, Part 1 & 2

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Can we design a slum-friendly city? Urban­-Think Tank discusses their urban strategy and how they work against structural inequality in cities.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

48 | Nurturing Collective Imagination in Rome

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Does design create politics or vice versa? Lorenzo Romito of Stalker discusses the ‘territory’ of architecture and how it can be expanded.
  • Advocacy
  • Environment
  • Urban Strategies

51 | Collective Mapping as a Tool for Social Change

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Does design create politics or vice versa? Iconoclasistas discusses the practice of collective mapping and how it can be mobilized to achieve social justice.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

53 | Designing After Revolution

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
How do we democratize design? Omar Nagati and Beth Stryker share their thoughts on CLUSTER Cairo, and the design of urban activism.
  • Urban Strategies

54 | Designing a Post-Industrial Future

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
How do we democratize design? John Fetterman of Braddock, PA, shares his thoughts on how to imagine a new future in a post-industrial landscape.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

75 | New Forms of Design Education for New Forms of Cities

Podcast
Can design education promote social justice? Christian Benimana is a senior principal and managing director at Mass Design. He also is the founder of the African Design Center.
  • Advocacy
  • Environment
  • Urban Strategies

79-80 | Inciting Radical Communities, Part 1 & 2

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
How can cities be reimagined by their citizens? Two central figures in public art and community building unveil how they help communities take control of their own futures.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

83 | Human-powered Resilience in Action

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Is Resilience Still Relevant? Architect Hsieh Ying-Chun joins host Eric Cesal to talk about how people can power rebuilding after disaster.
  • Community Development
  • Conflict and Disaster
  • Housing
  • Resilience
  • Urban Strategies

84-85 | Architecture, Wake Up, It’s a New Day, Part 1 & 2

Podcast
Is Resilience Still Relevant? Mario and Nuno do Rosario discuss the history of design in Mozambique from Independence to the present-day.
  • Community Development
  • Conflict and Disaster
  • Resilience
  • Urban Strategies

87 | Experiments in Resilience Amid the Backloop

Podcast
Is Resilience Still Relevant? Wakefield is an Urban Studies Foundation Research Fellow at Florida International University in the Department of Global and Sociocultural Studies. Her work, developed over the past decade of teaching and research in New York City, explores the diverse practices and technologies of resilient urbanism as both technical phenomenon and catalysts of new kinds of life in the Anthropocene.
  • Conflict and Disaster
  • Resilience
  • Urban Strategies

88 | How to Make Useful Noise

Podcast
Is Resilience Still Relevant? By the middle of this century, up to 300 million people will be displaced by climate change and climate change disasters. What is the ethical role of designers in adapting the built environment to such changes?
  • Community Development
  • Conflict and Disaster
  • Housing
  • Resilience
  • Urban Strategies

89 | How to Make More Integrated Humans

Podcast
Social Design Circle Honoree
Is Resilience Still Relevant? We had a chance to speak with Marcin Jakubowski on Social Design Insights, where he and our host Eric Cesal spoke about the future of agriculture, industry, and how to make more evolved humans.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Alliance of Community Trainers

CSF Grantee
Can design increase civic engagement? The Alliance of Community Trainers works with communities to create a shared vision and to empower communities with tools for problem solving, conflict resolution, alternative technology, environmental sustainability and more.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Conflict and Disaster
  • Environment
  • Resilience
  • Urban Strategies

Arquitectura Expandida

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
Should designers be outlaws? Founded in 2010, Arquitectura Expandida (AXP) is a design collective based in Bogota, Colombia focused on building structures for and with communities that cannot afford to go through official channels for design and construction.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Assemble

Social Design Circle Honoree
What is the antidote to luxury apartments no one will live in? Assemble Studio is a multi-disciplinary collective bridging the gaps between architecture, design, and art, and employing a democratic and cooperative working method that enables built, social, and research-based work at a variety of scales.
  • Urban Strategies

Atelier d’Architecture Autogérée

2011 Prize Winner
Video
Can a new urban future grow out of a vacant lot? Atelier d’Architecture Autogérée is a collective of architects that transforms urban spaces. It is recognized as an engine for engaging citizens in shaping their own cities through experimentation and renewal.
  • Urban Strategies

Basurama

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
Can waste be a resource for urban transformation? Best known for creating colorful playgrounds from common landfill waste, Basurama is a collective of Spanish artists whose projects provide cultural amenities while facilitating wider conversations about waste as a resource.
  • Urban Strategies

Breaking Ground

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
What is supportive housing? Breaking Ground innovated “supportive housing. It includes, but goes beyond, shelter. BG repurposes and builds dignified living environments that support residents via services including counseling, job services and more.
  • Housing
  • Urban Strategies

Center for Spatial Research

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can big data be used in the service of social justice? The Center for Spatial Research links design, architecture, urbanism and humanities with data science. Data is used in the service of justice; creating visualizations to understand cities, conflict and inequality.
  • Urban Strategies

CLUSTER Cairo

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
How do we democratize design? Founded in Egypt in response to the Arab Spring, Cairo Lab for Urban Studies, Training and Environmental Research (CLUSTER) is an interdisciplinary platform for urban design and research working to establish a critical space for urban discourse by engaging questions of public space and specifically, urban informality.
  • Urban Strategies

Coloco

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can a city work as an ecosystem? Coloco is a collective of landscapers, artists, urban planners, and botanists working in a variety of mediums including mapping, physical gardening, and advocacy.
  • Community Development
  • Environment
  • Urban Strategies

Ctrl+Z

Social Design Circle Honoree
Is architecture more about community participation than materials? Ctrl+Z Architecture practices collaborative, participatory, self-construction initiatives throughout the world. It believes that at its heart, architecture is more about interaction with communities than specific materials or approaches.
  • Community Development
  • Environment
  • Urban Strategies

Detroit Collaborative Design Center

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can Design Challenge Inequality? The Detroit Collaborative Design Center (DCDC), formerly the School of Architecture + Community Design, is a multidisciplinary nonprofit design center bringing high-quality, community-based design to all neighborhoods in Detroit.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Earth Activist Training

CSF Grantee
Can we design education for environmental sustainability? Author, activist and founder Starhawk offers Earth Activist Training in permaculture, nature awareness, earth based spirituality and more for individuals, teachers and community groups.
  • Community Development
  • Environment
  • Resilience
  • Urban Strategies

Echeverri & Fajardo

2009 Prize Winner
Video
Can improving the built environment in impoverished neighborhoods transform a city? Fajardo and Echeverri implemented a bold program in Medellín. By training architects to build parks and public buildings in impoverished neighborhoods, Medellin was transformed from “world’s deadliest city” into a vibrant, livable place.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Ecosistema Urbano

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
Can urban biodiversity be designed? Ecosistema Urbano is a Madrid-based architecture and design firm founded in 2005 by Belinda Tato and Jose Luis Vallejo.
  • Urban Strategies

Elemental

2010 Prize Winner
Video
Can public housing be designed to encourage resident ownership? ELEMENTAL engages in projects ranging from housing to public space to objects to buildings, covering a wide spectrum of interests. One of the firm´s hallmarks is participatory design, in which the architects work closely with the client and users.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Estudio Teddy Cruz + Forman

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
CSF Grantee
How can borders be places of innovation, creativity and exchange? Central to Estudio Teddy Cruz + Forman’s work is the idea that “borders” are not places to be defended, but can promote innovation and exchange.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

EXYZT

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
Can Design Reclaim Public Space? EXYZT was a European multidisciplinary design collective that broke extraordinary ground in challenging traditional notions of how public space can be organized.
  • Urban Strategies

Farm Cultural Park

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can rejuvenation through art transform a forgotten town? Farm Cultural Park (FCP) is an art gallery and exhibition space, located in Favara, Sicily. The aim of the project is to give the city, previously known mostly for its general decrepitude and for having one of Italy's highest unemployment rates, a new life through art.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Gulf Coast Community Design Studio

Social Design Circle Honoree
How can the community be integrated into the rebuilding process? A professional service and outreach program of Mississippi State University’s College of Architecture, Art + Design, Gulf Coast Community Design Studio (GCCDS) was established in Biloxi, Mississippi in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to provide design services to devastated communities throughout the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Over time, it has evolved to address long-term issues of equitable community resilience.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Iconoclasistas

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
Can maps promote equality and strategies of resistance? Iconoclasistas is a Buenos Aires-based design duo led by University of Buenos Aires professor Julia Risler and graphic designer and comic strip author Pablo Ares. The mission is to use cartography (maps) and other graphic art forms to create new visions of historic representation, societal growth, and participation.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Inteligencias Colectivas

Social Design Circle Honoree
What happens when traditional and modern design techniques are blended? Inteligencias Colectivas focuses on the ‘fringe’ of construction practice. Between highly mechanized construction and ancient methods are blended practices with their own wisdom. Inteligencias Colectivas¬ collects, collates and shares these.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Interboro

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
How can designers create a more inclusive space? Interboro is an architecture, urban design, and planning firm working across scales, from buildings to communities. They are known for a participatory, place-specific approach that helps build consensus around complex projects.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Interbreeding Field

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can Design Reclaim Public Space? Interbreeding Field is a Taiwanese educational program that creates installations in and about public space. Interbreeding Field’s work makes provocative commentary on how a space should or could be used.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Ishinomaki 2.0

Social Design Circle Honoree
How can a disaster be a catalyst for new visions? After the 2011 earthquake and tsunami destroyed their home, the founders of Ishinomaki 2.0 came together with the goal of rebuilding humble Ishinomaki into the ‘most interesting city in the world’.
  • Advocacy
  • Urban Strategies

Isla Urbana

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can DIY harvesting of rainwater solve a water crisis? Isla Urbana is a project dedicated to contributing to water sustainability in Mexico through rainwater harvesting.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Jeanne van Heeswijk

2012 Prize Winner
Video
Can art mend neighborhoods? Jeanne van Heeswijk is an artist who facilitates the creation of dynamic and diversified public spaces. Her long-scale community projects question art’s autonomy by combining performative actions, discussions, and other forms of organizing and pedagogy to assist communities to take control of their futures.
  • Advocacy
  • Urban Strategies

John Fetterman

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
How can a town decimated by globalization be revitalized? John Fetterman is an American politician who, as Mayor of Braddock, Pennsylvania, led the urban rejuvenation of a post-industrial city.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Kitaab Mahal – The Palace of Books

Design Foundation Initiative
How can the widening education gap be bridged? Kitaab Mahal is a children's library at Natwar Parekh Colony, designed and built by Community Design Agency in collaboration with the residents.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Lorenzo Romito

Does design create politics or vice versa? Lorenzo Romito of Stalker discusses the ‘territory’ of architecture and how it can be expanded.
  • Environment
  • Urban Strategies

MVD

Social Design Circle Honoree
How do we democratize design? MVD is an Austrian collective that works to bring a political view to how public space is utilized.
  • Housing
  • Urban Strategies

PICO Colectivo

Social Design Circle Honoree
Is design about the process or the result? PICO focuses on interventions in gathering spaces. They believe that architecture is not an end it in itself. The process of understanding the interaction of life and space is vital.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Public Works

Social Design Circle Honoree
How can neighborhood residents reassert control over their own futures? Public Works is a London-based critical design nonprofit straddling architecture, art, performance and activism. It addresses the challenges of urbanism, seeking ways that communities can reassert control over their futures.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Raumlabor Berlin

Social Design Circle Honoree
If utopia eluded us, what’s next? Raumlabor Berlin practices “research-based design.” Their practice intersects city planning, architecture, art and urban intervention. Central to their work are projects that disrupt a community’s notions about space.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Slum Redevelopment

Design Foundation Initiative
How can a designer build trust among residents under a constant threat of eviction? The residents of a Ahmednagar slum live under a constant threat of eviction. CDA is focusing on trust building, empowering residents to take on development and construction of their homes.
  • Community Development
  • Housing
  • Resilience
  • Urban Strategies

Stalker

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
Does design create politics or vice versa? Stalker is a collective of artists, architects, activists and others whose work focuses on the margins of the city.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Environment
  • Urban Strategies

STEALTH.unlimited

Social Design Circle Honoree
What are the limits of architectural practice? STEALTH.unlimited challenges notions about architectural practice by connecting arts, urban research, cultural activism and interventions. They have a particular focus on ‘common’ spaces shared by both the private and the public.
  • Advocacy
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

studioBASAR

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can design reconcile the legacy of brutal authoritarianism and the new forces of the market? studioBASAR is an architectural office and a “Search and Rescue” team conducting urban observation and intervention. It searches for overlooked urban conditions. Then the ‘rescue’ encompasses architectural interventions.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Urban-Think Tank

Social Design Circle Honoree
Podcast
How can urban dwellers participate in the construction of their own built environment? Urban-Think Tank (U-TT) is an interdisciplinary design studio dedicated to high-level research and design at a variety of scales. The studio champions collaborative work with intended users as a tool to develop spaces and projects that reinterpret the potential of unbuilt areas.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

Urbz

Social Design Circle Honoree
How can slum dwellers be protected against profit-minded developers? Urbz is an experimental action and research collective specialized in participatory planning and design. They work with citizens, associations, local governments, and private clients in Mumbai, Bogotá, and Geneva.
  • Community Development
  • Urban Strategies

USINA CTAH

Social Design Circle Honoree
Can the built environment escape a profit-driven motive? USINA Centro de Trabalhos para o Ambiente Habitado is a Brazilian group that works across disciplines to assist working people in planning and developing of their own communities.
  • Housing
  • Urban Strategies

Wes Janz

2008 Prize Winner
Video
How can designers address poverty in American cities? Dr. Wesley Janz is a Professor Emeritus of Architecture at Ball State University, Indiana and the founder of OneSmallProject. Currently, he is working to draw attention to the issues central to the U.S. prison system.
  • Advocacy
  • Environment
  • Housing
  • Urban Strategies

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      The Curry Stone Foundation (CSF) is the brainchild of architect, urban planner and developer Clifford Curry, FAIA, and the historical archeologist Dr. Delight Stone, RPA. It was inspired by a shared conviction that design thinking and design actions can—and should, serve those wishing to contribute to community vitality and human dignity. Most of all, we believe that design should be available to those most in need.

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      Curry Stone Foundation is receiving numerous unsolicited requests for support in light of this crisis. Many of these have significant merit, and we understand the need is great.

      Prior the Pandemic, our budget for 2020 and 2021 was committed to projects still in process, in India and elsewhere. Now, as a direct result of the crisis, we anticipate that these will need supplemental funds to reach completion. As these projects impact fragile, marginalized populations, we need to reserve emergency funds for that purpose.

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