We are RE.CO
a placemaking collective.
We are a group of experiential designers, artists, and planners working at the intersection of public space activation, advocacy, and the arts. Our collective interest does not solely lie in planning public spaces—we want to bring them to life!
We use tactile community engagement methods and experimental placemaking interventions to inform longer term design programs for urban public spaces.
From experiential engagement events and pilot programming, to urban prototyping and interim design, to civic marketing and identity kits, our primary objective is to connect people and place now, while collecting data and inspiration for more permanent project goals to follow.
We work independently, or together, depending on a project’s needs.
people make places great, not (just) designers.
Great public projects bring people from all parts of the community into the design process early and with genuine interest. We want to spend time in the community to truly get to know the people who will visit a space, perform in it, love it, and become its future stewards long after the design team has moved on. We want to meet in coffee shops and religious centers, on a bike or a subway car, in a living room or a trailhead. We want to eat with them, paint with them, and plant trees with them.
We do not just want to hear from people in town halls and community meetings, we want to craft reciprocal relationships that extend beyond typical public design processes. Not only do these relationships inform richer design, but they also create links to people, organizations, and programming partners that will stay involved with the project over time and advocate for its success.
every place has a story to tell.
What is the identity of a public space? Is it an inclusive place for gathering and respite? Is it a platform for culture? Is it an anchor for neighborhood wellbeing? A stimulus for growth? All places are some combination of these ideas and many more. Determining and following guiding principles that align project goals with community vision is perhaps the most challenging role of a design team.
We use visual storytelling, digital integrations, sound, color, artificial intelligence, and other narrative media to document the story of a place and ensure its brand honors and tells that story.
vision statement.
Every person should have ready access to clean and safe open space, natural beauty, art, and urban amenities. You should not have to live in a big city to have access to sustainable transportation, a suburb to have access to comfort, or the countryside to have access to nature.
We live in an era of more wealth, technology, and opportunity than any human before us could have ever imagined. But indicators of overall satisfaction are trending downward. Our environments have incredible impacts on how we feel and what we do. We think improving the environments we have access to will create a positive ripple effect into all other areas of life. There are many ways to improve this world, but our part is to focus on making public spaces in every community great.
It should not be a radical idea to expect these things from our cities.
- Rodrigo R Rodarte, RE.CO Founder
