WE SO PUMPED to be part of a knowledge exchange talk on Connecting Appalachia! With amazing people from Alabama and Vintage Theater in Clarksburg, and in the back stage room of @claycenter ! Sharin ideas on how we make connections within Appalachia, and between Appalachian and the World. Proximity and closeness breeds idea sharing and ideation. It’s something we take for granted in urban areas, where we are vertically stacked on top of eachother, and something we have to purposefully cultivate and manifest in rural America. So grateful for National Consortium for Placemaking, @tamarackfoundation, and all your partners for pulling us together the past two days at #cpls Appalachia! Monday morning we’ll be doing a brain download on all we’ve learned and all the inspiring folks we’ve met. #lookingatappalachia #connectingappalachia #creativeplacemaking @cpl_summit

Designed a 1 hour mural prototype with these two local hero women Neighborhood planner Susie Salisbury and @gkvf Community Foundation exec Dr. Michelle Foster this morning through the @goodspacemurals Co-design workshopping !!!!! Inspired by the women sitting next to us, and the women directing us. Asking us to be witness to one another in this work. Mural titled: let’s lift eachother up. ❤️ #cpls #lookingatappalachia #femalefuture

SO MANY FOLKS from all over Appalachia tourin our Elk City neighborhood during this Creative Placemaking Leadership Summit: Appalachia !!! Thanks to the corners of West Virginia to Alabama to Georgia for letting us show you around our little neighborhood. We’re tackling everything from temporary art installs to unconventional workforce dev to mixed use space to creative financing to eyes on the street over here and there is always more to learn. Did you know that Elk City was originally its own city, until it was annexed into Charleston? Or that about half our west side building stock is considered abandoned? Learned that from our neighborhood planner today. Pumped for more workshops tomorrow at the @claycenter - hope to 👀 you there!! #elkcity #makeshop #creativeplacemaking #lookingatappalachia #cpls #gotowv @charlestonwv