DESIGN THINKING & STRATEGIES II

Culturally Relevant Design

The following design directives for implementing culturally relevant design are taken from Forsyth et al. “Plazas, Streets, and Markets: What Puerto Ricans Bring to Urban Spaces in Northern Climates.” Forsyth et al. studied and outlined the features of urban design in Puerto Rico and compared “the environments that the residents left behind to those that they have come to inhabit in Holyoke.” Their report is written for “non-Puerto Rican landscape architects, neighborhood planners, and urban designers working with Puerto Rican populations.” They emphasize that this design process must involve a “participatory design” which engages Puerto Rican residents more deeply in the design.

• Design plaza-like spaces with large, open central areas.

• When possible, central plaza type public spaces should have a significant connection to community buildings and commercial areas.

• Plaza spaces should contain substantial amounts of paved surfaces that are framed by planting beds.

• Paved surfaces should accommodate a variety of patterns and colors.

• Large canopy trees should be used in the planting beds, creating shade and defining the open spaces.

• Allow for activities and structures that are culturally specific, such as dominoes tables, vending carts, and marketplaces.

• Public spaces should be multi-use and allow for a variety of activities and flexible programming.

• Allow for the use of bright colors and decoration both in open spaces and on structural elements such as buildings and utility poles.

• Allow for the use of cultural symbols related to ethnic identity including depictions in murals.

During the first April core client team meeting, the team shared features of their favorite outdoor gathering spaces in Holyoke, Puerto Rico, and other Latin American countries, like Peru. They admired the community, festivities, multi-generational spaces, art, food, play, music, and socializing occurring in grandma's backyard," "our old neighborhood," "Parque Kennedy" and other cherished spaces.

WICKED PROBLEMS: WHAT CAN LANDSCAPE DESIGN DO?

As described to the Conway team by University of Massachusetts architecture professor and Director of El Corazon, Joseph Krupczynski, this Holyoke neighborhood faces “wicked problems,” due to poverty, homelessness, drug use, and other social and environmental injustices existing. A wicked problem is a difficult to solve problem due to having a “complex and interconnected nature” (Wong, 2022). Wicked problems cannot be solved by one discipline, but require a multi-pronged approach with multidisciplinary collaborators (Krupczynski, 2023).

Landscape design cannot solve the injustices identified within the project area alone, but it can be one tool alongside existing community organizations, government initiatives, community members, and new partnerships and movements working toward addressing systemic injustices in this neighborhood.

Green gentrification is the process of environmental uplift in communities through the creation of green spaces and sustainable infrastructure that can lead to increased housing prices and displacement of residents. In "Retracted: Urban Greening as the Ultimate Urban Environmental Justice Tragedy", Isabelle Anguelovski says that in the process of green gentrification “as formerly degraded neighborhoods get cleaned up and benefit from new environmental goods, they start to become valued again by outside private investors.” Oftentime low-income communities of color experiencing green gentrification will receive an “influx of new, wealthier and often white residents” who may displace original residents (Rigolon et al 1). These new residents “are often the ones who are able to enjoy the new green amenities from which low-income residents and minorities had been historically deprived of and, in many cases, originally fought for” (Anguelovski, 2016).

This planset proposes a design that includes greening of the project site. As a wicked problem, addressing green gentrification may require multiple strategies that involve collaboration with communities, governments, social organizations, and other stakeholders that work toward implementing “anti-displacement and green inclusive policies”, including affordable housing policies (Rigolon, 2019).

Designed By: Eva Hogue & Bindu Nicholson