Mini-golf, anyone?

PDA is excited to announce our latest collaboration with Airbnb for the 2015 Brooklyn Half Marathon pre-race event! Come down to Brooklyn Bridge Park this Wednesday, Thursday or Friday and enjoy 6 holes of Brooklyn-themed mini-golf, as well as music, food, drinks, workshops, installations and all-around good times right on the water looking out on lower Manhattan. It's a great backdrop for a little putt-putt!

It was really fun choosing six iconic Brooklyn locations and designing mini courses around their essential elements, like Grand Army Plaza's rotary or Coney Island's Cyclone rollercoaster. Also amazing was seeing these ideas translated into illustration by Agnes Lee and how the talented fabricators at Hewn Bros. brought it to life!

Head down to Pier 2, 150 Furman Street in Brooklyn: 

Wednesday, May 13 from 12 pm to 9 pm

Thursday, May 14 from 12 pm to 9 pm

Friday, May 15 from 10 am to 9 p.m

Grand Army Plaza As Mini Golf Course

We heart PHXUDW!

We had a great time back in April participating in Phoenix Urban Design Week (in case you're wondering what that acronym is all about)! PHXUDW consists of urban planners, designers, landscape architects, and policy makers to entrepreneurs, artists, and placemaking specialists who are working on making Phoenix a more sustainable and vibrant city.

Thanks to Arizona State University for hosting our talk on design strategies for participation. Sarah and I met some great ASU students at studio visits working on projects ranging from rethinking society's collective wealth in terms of sustainability to exploring the difference between happiness and joy through interior design. Awesome stuff, people!

We also got to roll out a new and improved version of the IDEA tarot cards, for which we asked the audience members to fill out one of the four kinds of cards with their ideas for Issues, Do-ers, Environments and Actions. The purpose of the cards is to spark some new ways of thinking around how we approach activism and social change. We all expect environmentalists to march to city hall to protest fracking, but do we expect nurses to dance at Best Buy in support of a living wage for all workers?

Groups of students received their tarot by choosing randomly from the deck of ideas, but, of course, we couldn't stop there! Each group from the audience then had to face off with the other groups in a charades-a-thon to act out their very special IDEA combinations. I find that when we're forced to turn to alternative forms of communication, it helps our brains make new connections. It's also a great way to end a talk!

- Jill

Create a TED Talk Mad Lib!

It has been a couple weeks since my return from TED2015. What an incredible whirlwind! Still a lot to process, but it in the meantime, enjoy this TED Talk Mad Lib that I created during my time inVancouver. 

Download interactive PDF 

- Sarah