hi, i’m joanne laian wu, an interdisciplinary urban designer and strategist at the intersection of placekeeping, public space and participatory design.

in our ever-changing cities, it’s more crucial than ever that our built environment is designed and led by the communities that experience them. communities don’t need “revitalization”—all communities contain vitality regardless of their built environment—communities need resources and empowerment to achieve agency and self-determination over their own spaces.

by re-envisioning and restructuring the way in which we produce spaces through shared knowledge and decolonized storytelling, I aim to help forge a new urban imaginary where spaces truly reflect the people that occupy them.

in other words: let’s build our cities together.