Andrew Todd Alex Gilliam Lindsey Dugdill Michael van Gessel Kanten Russell
Alex Gilliam
A cheerleader of possibility, Alex Gilliam is the founder of Public Workshop, an organization that redefines the way youth and communities participate as citizens and leaders in the design of their neighborhoods and cities. Alex fundamentally believes that great design, empowerment, innovation, and having fun are not mutually exclusive. He creates inspiring curricula, transformative youth design leadership programs, innovative participatory community design tools, engaging events and thoughtful strategies that help people rethink possibility. Alex has worked with numerous organizations, museums, universities, architecture firms and city agencies including the Charter High School For Architecture and Design in Philadelphia, Rural Studio, Hester Street Collaborative, Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum, University of Pennsylvania, University of Texas, Chicago Architecture Foundation, Landon Bone Baker Architects, Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Open House New York, and the City of Austin, Texas. In addition, Alex is a national expert on K-12 design education with an emphasis on service learning and was the 2010 Field Fellow at the National Building Museum in Washington, DC. Alex is a Senior Lecturer in the Design Department at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. His work has been featured on NPR’s Studio 360 and in magazines such as Metropolis, ID, Architect and the Architect’s Newspaper as well as showcased on various company websites including Fast Company, BMW Guggenheim Lab|Log, Kaboom!, Core 77, Yahoo and NBC’s TODAY. Alex was recently named by Philadelphia Magazine as one of the ‘brightest minds’ in Philadelphia and as one of the top 100 public interest designers in the country.
Alex’s recent work includes creating a green design leadership program in Chicago that trains young people to gather the environmental data and collect the stories that substantiate design changes in their neighborhoods; developing unique designbuild place-making events to better engage youth and community in a master planning process in Austin, TX; designing a NEA funded youth community design leadership program for middle schools in the Bronx; creating a full scale building system that allows young people to prototype their own playgrounds in under-used public spaces; design-building adventure playgrounds and exercise courses in Philadelphia and Flint; opening the Department of Making + Doing, a making-oriented civic innovation workshop; and launching Tiny WPA, a program to redesign and rebuild Philadelphia’s public spaces and micro-infrastructure through improvements initiated by youth.
Atmosphere is generously supported by the Faculty of Architecture Endowment Fund and the following professional associations: the Manitoba Association of Architects (MAA); the Manitoba Association of Landscape Architects (MALA); and the Professional Interior Designers Institute of Manitoba (PIDIM).
Aspects of Atmosphere 2014 ACTION are being presented in collaboration with StoreFront Manitoba and aceartinc.