The Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative’s work is featured in the Neighbourhood Index at the 2022 Oslo Architecture Triennale!
With a theme of Mission Neighbourhood – (Re)forming Communities, the Triennale explores how we form the places we share. Mission Neighbourhood is an invitation to broaden the collective imagination regarding the spaces of everyday life.
The CUDC’s project, Neighborhood Food Futures, documents Cleveland’s existing and emerging food sectors and proposes a framework for integrating a diverse range of food enterprises into a robust and resilient foodscape. We envision a future where food entrepreneurs are nurtured across the spectrum–from home-based businesses to local start-ups to national/international food enterprises. In addition to providing sustenance in a hungry city, Neighborhood Food Futures lays the groundwork for advanced food manufacturing operations such as lab grown meat, 3D printed foods, and zero-waste food packaging.
Food manufacturing can add value to urban neighborhoods through flexible production facilities. Spaces and places for food production can be designed as urban infrastructure, encompassing all stages of the food supply chain: growing food/urban farming, food processing/making; shared kitchens and production spaces, food retail; and food waste recycling/composting.
Neighborhood Food Futures aims to incubate innovative food businesses and agro-industries for a more prosperous and healthy city. Food operations integrate more easily into city neighborhoods than other forms of industry since they are cleaner and more compatible with residential areas. Neighborhood residents are a nearby work force and an underserved consumer base. Neighborhood Food Futures reconnects food production to consumption and makes food systems legible in city neighborhoods.
Neighborhood Food Futures expands upon the CUDC’s work over the past twelve years on issues of urban food production and vacant land reuse, and also features work from a recent Community Design Charrette conducted in partnership with MidTown Cleveland and the Cleveland Central Kitchen.