Exactly what my talented sweetheart @jaketobin.bsky.social said. 💯 #ontario #onpoli

Toronto currently has the second worst air quality in the world. And this is what it takes for our government to gently suggest we drive less. No major policy changes. No investments in public or active transportation infrastructure. This is the environmental version of “thoughts and prayers.”

One of the images from my daughter’s Winners brand shoot. Her stylist, Biba Esaad, pulled designer pieces, and artist Ember Sough brought her photos to life with his illustrations. I loved being her assistant for the afternoon before she headed back on tour in the UK.

Full article and link to series here: www.azuremagazine.com/article/publ...

Part 3 of my Azure series is out. I explore Healthy Spatial Entitlement through an experience I had with unhoused youth during my Public Joy pilot project last summer. In many ways, the experience brought my practice into conversation with my work alongside incredible unhoused youth decades ago.

Black Public Joy has officially made its way to Buffalo. It was part of a thoughtful gift exchange. I'm continually grateful for the incredible community of readers who've embraced this work—not only reading it, but carrying it across cities and gifting it to friends and colleagues. Thank you.

Co-stewardship is a principle of my Public Joy Framework. We are partially responsible for one another's dignity, safety and flourishing in public space. A co-stewardship practice is, “if we arrive together we leave together.” The Nolan Wells case reveals the complexity of this principle & practice.

As we head into another critical mayoral race, with a contender who’s been able to build significant financial support, capital P progressives need to be more nuanced than telling folks to ignore their critique of Olivia Chow to avoid a worse option. Y’all have a serious communication problem. 🧵

Feeling incredibly fortunate to be booking well into the fall. I’m honoured to be heading to Calgary this October as the Closing Forum speaker for the Creative City Summit. Grateful to the Creative City Network of Canada and the City of Calgary for the invitation.

Let's explore the difference between belonging and dignified belonging. We all yearn to belong. But sometimes belonging comes at unhealthy costs, including self-silencing, shrinking, concealing parts of our identities, tolerating disrespect, or compromising our values. #PublicJoyFramework

I also share a couple of images developed during a design charrette. I translated stories and insights from my book into a few tangible design guidelines and applied them to a Vancouver-based Black youth tech hub. This work was generously supported by Urbanarium and designers in their network.

In this piece, I answer key questions about the book’s origin, my research, and my assertion that all public joy is more than cultural expression or emotion but rather infrastructure.

Since the launch of Black Public Joy, not a single week has gone by without a speaking invitation, media feature, or engagement. This week, I'm honoured to be in conversation with Dr. Dori Tunstall, leading design scholar, for Everything Is Political. Never referred to as a design warrior before :)

This photo of masked white supremacists on public transit surrounding a young Black woman challenges my Public Joy Framework. Applying “public joy” to this image almost feels vulgar. But because my framework is rooted in structural socio-spatial analysis, not just emotion, here’s a few questions 🧵

In a bar rooting for the home team. We’re not out yet. Plus we’ve got a lot of Jamaican Canadians on our team so there’s also that :)

My daughter and I have both been on tour, so I haven’t seen her for an entire season. She was in Toronto this evening doing a brand shoot before heading to Vancouver to perform tomorrow. I popped in to give her a hug, and got to be her personal assistant for a few hours.💕

Although my book is available internationally, I felt emotional when a bookstore clerk proudly placed this sticker on it. Although we must all work to make this country better, I appreciate the freedoms, opportunities & relationships I have here. It’s okay to hold complexity today & every day.

What I especially love about @jaketobin.bsky.social’s PRIDE poster is that it highlights and honours the multiplicity of PRIDE’S meanings and expressions.

Every PRIDE, I celebrate my Irish Canadian second-grade teacher turned second dad. He introduced me to public spaces beyond the four-block radius of my public housing community, which undoubtedly contributed to my sense of healthy spatial entitlement, and later, a binational public space practice.

At my book events there’s music, food, hair braiding & convo so this beautiful community begins to build before I say a single word. Every time I enter the room or mount the stage, I have this visceral feeling of entering a moment my book, community, and client collaborators have gifted me with.

With the Knicks epic win & FIFA, there’s currently lots of public joy talk. But let’s remember that we should be amplifying, advocating for, & participating in daily expressions of public joy. This sweet subway moment is a great example of that—spontaneous, cross-racial, intergenerational & $0.

In my latest essay for Azure, I use the New York Knicks’ historic win and the city’s celebrations as a civic case study, exploring how expressions of public joy are often tied to the public policies and governance that shape everyday public life—including @mayor.nyc.gov’s vision and agenda.

This is bigger than any premier or party. If a single elected official can unilaterally advance policies with adverse public safety impacts, we should be asking hard questions about the strength of our democracy & advocating like hell for evidence-based placemaking. #EvidenceBasedPlacemaking

It’s alarming that pedestrianization projects—among the most powerful catalysts of public joy practices & expressions—are being viewed so heavily through a policing lens. This approach reveals significant gaps in the City’s thinking & vision as it strives to expand pedestrianization initiatives.

A big congratulations to Armi DeFrancia on her well-deserved CIP Emerging Planner Award. For a decade, I’ve had the delightful experience of mentoring Armi & was happy to nominate her. Watching Armi build her career & develop a powerful cycling advocacy voice has been incredible. So proud of her.

I begin my keynotes by telling audiences that I don’t think I’m interesting or charming enough to speak uninterrupted for an hour. I’m actually reasonably interesting and charming. But I don’t think the world needs more one-way convos or more middle-aged “experts” speaking at people.

Looking forward to today's Black Public Joy webinar hosted by acclaimed urbanist @penalosag.bsky.social, Founder of 8 80 Cities. We are expecting more than 500 participants, primarily from Canada and the United States, with attendees joining from more than 20 countries around the world.

I’m often asked what co-stewarding public joy is. It’s smiling at a new neighbour, withholding judgement when someone is experiencing homelessness, or intervening when a young woman is being harassed. Yes, co-stewardship is labour, but it’s also a beautiful practice for repairing public life.

As I've toured with Black Public Joy, I've been vigilant about emphasizing that this concept is not strictly expression, style, or swagger. It is also a form of cultural infrastructure & spatial intelligence. That said, the DR Congo team arriving for #FIFA is def bringin’ style and swagger :)

There’s nothing wrong with taking up space and I have nothing against anyone named Linda. But we’ve become so focused on taking up space that we’ve lost sight of the fact that sharing space with each other is sacred, a privilege, and community as a verb. Here’s a clip from my CBC Ideas feature.