The loon is Minnesota’s state bird. This aquatic bird is mysterious and intriguing for a number of reasons including its physical stark appearance with its black and white markings and red eyes and one of its sounds, the ‘tremolo’, that resembles maniacal laughter. I am currently facilitating, with colleagues, a community-engaged project to design a…
This morning I have been thinking about the need to make empathy be the core of design and development, of connecting to people and places and of working to create a future, one community at a time. The current short version of the idea in my mind is ‘Love. Connect. Create.’ Drawing from the field…
I’ve just returned from the first national Rural Creative Placemaking Summit ‘Next Generation’ organized by the Rural Policy Research Institute (RUPRI), Art of the Rural, with other partners and held in Iowa City on October 12-14th, 2016. It was completely energizing to be in the company of national and state level policy makers, farmers, designers,…
In my work, leading the Design for Community Resilience program in the University of Minnesota’s Center for Sustainable Building Research. I work with communities across Minnesota in assisting the design and implementation of their sustainable futures. It is very rewarding work on many levels, not the least of which is the connection to the work…
Reading a book Living in Motion: Design and architecture for flexible dwelling by editors Mathias Schwartz-Clauss, Alexander Von Vegesack (Vitra Design Museum, 2002). It examines flexibility and dynamic qualities from work designed by Modern architects Frank Lloyd Wright, Charles and Ray Eames, Rem Koolhaas, Shigeru Ban and others and mobile and flexible vernacular dwellings from…
Have you seen this incredible work by Fernanda Viegas and Martin Wattenberg, found here? You can see a real time wind map of the United States showing the ‘the delicate tracery of wind flowing over the US.’ What strikes me is the minimalism and apparent simplicity of representation, which can have been anything but simple…
A couple weeks ago, an article by professors Melinda Harm Benson and Robin K. Craig, The End of Sustainability, published in Ensia magazine (‘Ideas, information and inspiration to change the world’) sparked off a debate in sustainability circles. It calls for us to ‘collectively reexamine — and ultimately move past — the concept of sustainability,’ even…
