The Rebirth of a Nonprofit Is Based on the Network It Served

Back in 2015, NPQ wrote fairly extensively about the closing of an international group called Architecture for Humanity, which championed humanitarian design often in the aftermath of crisis. Its tagline, “design like you give a damn,” knit together architects of conscience for projects like the redesign of schools in Haiti following the catastrophic earthquake of 2010. But the group began to experience a financial crisis of its own a few years before it declared itself done after 16 years as a single organization. A redesign had already begun in the network design of the organization’s base chapters that connected groups of pro bono architects all over the world. These continued to function and communicate without the central hub, and in 2016 the newly designed vehicle for the still-strong movement became the Open Architecture Collaborative (OAC). Core to its organizing values were participatory design and longer-term relationships with community. “The OAC began in response to a need for a renewed and more relevant mission to the issues of our time,” explains Garrett Jacobs, executive director of the organization, who refers to the group’s purpose as public interest design. “A deeper commitment to an equitable, inclusive, and needs-based approach was formed. We now work beyond just one-off projects and scrutinize the larger, systemic issues that caused the need for our services in the first place. We reflect more on who we are and the privileges we’ve had. This allows us to show up more authentically and build trust with communities affected by generational trauma.” The Open Architecture Collaborative, to extend the design concept, does not claim to be alone in its mission, says Jacobs, pointing to Colloqate, Designing Justice + Designing Spaces (DJDS), and Creative Reaction Lab as other nodes of the work. “I do not believe I am working on the margins of the profession,” said Jacobs. “I believe my colleagues and contemporaries, whom I am inspired by every day, are working to define the future of our industry. The structures of our businesses are a small component to how we are shifting the perception of design and the place it has in how we come together as a culture. Our processes are driven by equity and a new balance of power. You must be committed to those values if you have hope that creative processes can facilitate our way to a more just future.”