Creative Mornings Ottawa, February 2021: Divergent with Sarah Gelbard

Anarchist. Punk rocker. Architect?

If our February 2021 speaker has anything to say about it, some day all three of these subjects will be some day be analogous.

Sarah Gelbard is part anarchitect, part punk planner, and a Ph.D. candidate in Urban Planning at McGill University. Her research looks at community placemaking and place-based storytelling. 

She studies conflicts between mainstream planning and the marginalized alternative urban groups who diverge from the normative public interests that shape city plans.

To speak to the global CreativeMornings theme of “Divergent,” Sarah will deliver a talk called “Divergent City” on February 26, 2021. It will examine how elite architects, inaccessible technocrats and profit-driven planning has . the cosmopolitan ideal of cities “bringing people together” is more myth than reality 

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She’ll instead present a different vision for how we build (and build up) cities, one in which design is democratized, “punk bathrooms” and “impromptu playgrounds” are ever-present and cities are built for people – not cars.

Oh yeah, and one in which capitalism is destroyed.

More than anything, Sarah will present a vision for the future in which people are at the centre of how we build, create and connect.

Sarah is known for her Brutalist architecture walking tours, is the Ottawa editor of Spacing Magazine, and a former regular contributor to Centretown Buzz. Sarah is also the lead singer, songwriter, and bass player in local Ottawa punk band Bad Missionary.

Get to know Sarah better by checking out her content on Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.

Get your free tickets here!