Urban Design toward Ecological Design: Partnerships, Participation, and Ecosystemic Thinking

2023–2026

Faculty:

Ignacio Cardona, Coordinator and Instructor

Institution:

Wentworth Institute of Technology

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Developed since Fall 2023, this sequence of urban design studios explores how partnerships can expand urban design toward ecological design. Working with communities, institutions, and professionals, students approach cities and territories as interconnected social, spatial, and ecological systems. The studio positions urban design as a collective process of inquiry, dialogue, and experimentation rather than solely the production of individual design proposals.

The most recent iteration, TapiriTech in N’dakinna, works with Indigenous partners, the University of New Hampshire, and Perkins&Will to integrate Indigenous knowledge, participatory practices, and more-than-human perspectives into climate-adaptive urban design.

Across the sequence, urban design progressively becomes a framework for negotiating relationships among communities, institutions, landscapes, and ecological systems—moving from participation toward ecological reciprocity and Ecosystemic Democracy.