Being a Next City Vanguard

Last year in April, I had the great opportunity to be part of Vanguard Conference organized by Next City in Reno, NV - it was a fantastic opportunity to meet and learn from energetic and enthusiastic young urban leaders from all around the country. The format of the conference was extremely refreshing and interactive. The added feature was the Big Idea Challenge which challenged the group to come up with a pitch to present to a local group of community and business organizations after two days of understanding the challenges and opportunities of Reno.

A year after, Tom Dallesio, Executive Director of Next City has brought us together to share our experience in Reno with the audience of the American Institute of Architecture annual conference hosted this year in Next City's hometown: Philadelphia. Karen Kubey (Institute for Public Architecture), Gina Ford (Sasaki Associates) and myself had also a chance to share briefly among ourselves and with the audience about our work and practice after the conference in Reno.