Restorative Community Design: From Spatial Inequality to Community Agency

2022–2026

Faculty:

Ignacio Cardona, Instructor

Institution:

Wentworth Institute of Technology

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This graduate seminar explores how architecture and urban design can address spatial inequalities by positioning designers as researchers and facilitators of community engagement. Restorative Community Design brings together Restorative Justice, Participatory Design, and Spatial Opportunity, connecting community knowledge with the Right to the City and spatial transformation.

Readings, interviews, stakeholder engagement, and design research move students from evidence to spatial strategies, progressing from trauma-informed and participatory design to Just Cities, Spatial Opportunities, and Ecosystemic Democracy—expanding the concept of community to include ecological and more-than-human actors.

Partnerships with real communities, facilitated by the Community Design and Research Center (CDRC) and the Spatial Opportunity Lab (SOLAB), connect theory with situated research and engagement while maintaining an ethical and philosophical inquiry into spatial justice, participation, power, inequality, and community agency.