Designing With the Desert series — Fluidity and Form: Navigating Arid Design Realities

We are thrilled to invite you to the conversation series, "Designing With the Desert" marking the inception of this transformative initiative. As we not only inhabit the Sonoran Desert but rather, we are part of it, this series seeks to unravel the intricate relationships between humans with this fragile yet resilient land. Come and critically explore with panelists and facilitators the multiple ways we dwell in the Sonoran Desert, how we constantly transform it, and how we dialogue with it or ignore it. This land, stewarded by ancestral people for centuries is facing multiple challenges while offering unique design opportunities.

In the third installment of the series: Fluidity and Form: Navigating Arid Design Realities we will invite you to immerse yourself in discussions on Indigenous placemaking, water and design, desert edges, mindfulness and materiality, and diversity in design. This conversation delves into the fluid dynamics of designing within arid environments, navigating boundaries, and celebrating the diverse forms designing with the desert can take.

Moderators:
Brie Smith and Felipe Mesa

Speakers:
• “Indigenous Placemaking + Design” by Wanda Dalla Costa, Director of the Indigenous Design Collaborative & Institute Professor, The Design School
• “Water and Design Bounded Together” by Kelly Wiehe: Project Manage, City of Tucson I Tucson Water
• “Water and the Celebration of the Senses” by Michele Shelor, Landscape Architect, Principal, Colwell and Shelor
• “Desert Edges and Boundaries” by Philip Weddle, FAIA, Weddle Gilmore Architects
• “Diversity in Design” by Carlos A. Murrieta, AIA, NCARB, NOMA, Co-Founder / Principal Merge Architectural Group
• “The Performative Power of Materiality” by Bilge Merve Aktaş, Designer and Textile Maker