Cultural Activism: Using Design As A Means To Build & Grow Communities
Finding Genius Podcast
Richard Jacobs
4.4 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 24 October 2023
⏱️ 37 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today, we connect with Mark Lakeman, the founder of City Repair, a non-profit placemaking movement and organization. He is also the principal and design director of Communitecture, a community architecture and planning firm. Recognized as a leader in the development of sustainable public places, Mark is on a mission to provide a beneficial vision for human and ecological communities.
Mark has professional training in architecture and permaculture. Drawing from this background, he is what's called a "design activist". How do his projects impact the development landscape of the United States? He sits down to explain…
In this episode, we go over:
- Why the history of the U.S. prioritizes real estate development over cultural development.
- Why people's relationships affect how local problems are solved.
- The importance of community space in a cultural setting.
Want to learn more about Mark and his work? Click here now!
Episode also available on Apple Podcast: http://apple.co/30PvU9C
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Forget frequently asked questions common sense common knowledge or Google how about advice from a real genius |
| 0:06.6 | 95% of people in any profession are good enough to be qualified and licensed 5% go above beyond. They become very good at what they do, but only 0.1% are real Jesus. |
| 0:18.0 | Richard Jacobs has made it his life's mission to find them for you. He hunts down and interviews geniuses in every field, |
| 0:25.0 | sleep science, cancer, stem cells, ketogenic diets, and more. Here come the geniuses. |
| 0:30.0 | This is the Finding Genius Podcast. |
| 0:33.0 | That is Richard Jacobs. |
| 0:35.0 | Hello, this is Richard Jacobs with the Finding Genius Podcast. |
| 0:41.0 | I guest is Mark Lakeman. |
| 0:43.3 | He's a principal and design lead of city repair. |
| 0:46.6 | We're going to talk about an interesting topic, |
| 0:48.3 | how to turn your neighborhood into a village. |
| 0:50.3 | So we'll find out what that means and talk to Mark about his company. So welcome Mark. Thank you |
| 0:54.9 | Thanks Richard's pleasure to be here. Yeah, tell me a bit about your background and then what's the premise of you know of your company? Yeah, so my background is that, I mean, my professional training is that I'm an architect and a |
| 1:06.1 | permaculturist and a planner, so I do a lot of work in that, in those realms of what I call design activism. |
| 1:14.6 | We definitely have different areas of impact |
| 1:18.4 | and oftentimes we're initiating projects |
| 1:22.2 | rather like a developer, but sometimes we're just working based on social capital. |
| 1:26.4 | I wear a different hat. So on one hand, I'm working in the non-profit sphere of city repair, |
| 1:31.7 | and then another I'm working in the design office called |
| 1:35.1 | communit texture or community architecture and where sort of spectrum of work that we |
| 1:40.4 | do on one hand in the non-profit is to try to retrofit and the |
| 1:45.4 | placeless development landscape of the United States, city by city town by town, |
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