Flux in the City - A Conversation on Human-Centred Design Ft. Zahra Ebrahim

How, do we build cities, plan cities, and study cities and how can we do that equitably?

On the Flux in the City podcast, Wesley Reibeling and Nathaniel Hanula-James create space to explore themes of equitable cities and participatory art practices in urban environments.

We invited leaders, city planners, artists, movers, shakers and everyone in between about their own experiences in cities, and have frank conversations about creating better futures for all. 

Our first Guest is Zahra Ebrahim. Zahra is a public interest designer, civic entrepreneur, and leader. She is the co-founder and CEO of Monumental, a partnership with Kofi Hope focused on creating fair and just cities and institutions, in support of an equitable recovery from COVID-19. Her professional practice has been focused on shifting power to people who are typically underrepresented in institutions and systems and has done so by designing deep, community-led approaches to policy, infrastructure, and service design. She is an Executive Advisor to Deloitte on human-centred approaches to public sector innovation and a senior advisor to political and public interest initiatives across the country. Prior to this role, she built and led Doblin Canada (Deloitte’s Human-Centred Design practice), focusing on engaging diverse sets of stakeholders to use human-centred design to address complex organizational and industry challenges, largely focused on public sector and civic innovation. Prior to Doblin, Zahra led one of Canada’s first social design studios, archiTEXT, working with communities to co-design towards better social outcomes and leading some of Canada’s most ambitious participatory infrastructure and policy programs. 

Zahra has taught at OCADU, MoMA, and currently teaches at the University of Toronto Scarborough. She has served on the boards of Jane’s Walk, St. Stephen’s Community House, Toronto Biennial, and Canadian Urban Institute, and is the current Chair of the Board for Park People. She serves as an advisor for a range of organizations including Toronto Public Library, Progress Toronto, and Code for Canada. She was recently named Next City’s Vanguard “40 under 40 Civic Leader”, Ascend Canada’s Mentor of the Year, one of “Tomorrow’s Titans” in Toronto Life, and one of WXN’s Top 100 Women in Canadian Business.

These are links to resources, and websites mentioned in today's episode.

• DesignTo Zahra video link: Accountable Space in Design - DesignTO
• Monumental link: Monumental
• Making Space website: Making Space - People Design Co-operative
• Arnstein's Ladder of Citizen Participation
• Antionette Carroll
• Janeswalktoronto.org