Impact x Design Panel: Radical Futures
Wednesday, October 2nd, 2024 @ Kiln
Doors at 5:30 pm; Panel begins at 6 pm
We know the future needs to be divergent from where it is now. It will take courage, gumption, resilience, grace, creativity, and a lot of love to get there. Examining the real tensions that come up when we try to implement the imperative to “design with, not for” in various contexts will only allow us to design better. And we use the term futures (plural) because we know there are many possibilities not just for what is yet to come but also for what we’re doing now and HOW we will get there…
Featured Panelists
Suzanne Chou (she/her)
Equitable Design Researcher
Suzanne Chou is the community engagement strategist for the Multnomah County Library Capital Building Projects, where she works with architects, library staff and community members to ensure that communities are equitably engaged throughout the design process. Suzanne received her PhD in the human-centered design research field, focused on improving the ways we design to create more positive outcomes for communities.
Connor Larsen (he/him)
Senior Product Designer, Design Systems, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative
Connor Larsen is a senior product designer at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative with a specialization in design systems where he works with engineers, product managers, biologists, AI specialists, and other science-y folks to help bring visual and functional consistency across CZI’s suite of science applications. He has worked in the product space at a range of organizations, always laser-focused on ensuring the best possible experience for all users.
Desiree Williams-Rajee
Climate Equity Senior Fellow, PolicyLink
Principal and Owner, Kapwa Consulting, LLC
For over 20 years, Desirée has worked with a variety of organizations including community development, environmental policy organizations, and government agencies as well as various grassroots initiatives to address institutional and structural change toward racial equity. Focusing on systems and cultural change through her firm Kapwa Consulting, LLC, her role is to help others strategically navigate towards sustainable solutions that build community resilience. She received her Master of International Development degree from the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs from University of Pittsburgh, a MBA in Sustainable Business from Presidio Graduate School, and a Master's in Depth Psychology with a concentration on Community Liberation Indigenous Ecopsychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute.
Sophia Xiao-Fan Austrins (she/they)
Co-Director, Colloqate Design
Sophia Xiao-fan Austrins (she/they) is an architect, artist, and facilitator strengthening community and culture through design activism. They are a director with Colloqate Design, a nonprofit practice seeking to design spaces of racial, social, and cultural justice throughout the built environment. In her work designing libraries, community centers, resource hubs, housing, installations and exhibits, and spaces for creativity and learning; she seeks to share the power of the built environment with communities who have been left out of our design processes and storytelling; not only because they deserve to create their own futures, but also to find the moments of delight and community growth that the act of designing together can create.
Panel Moderator
Mary Li (she/my name)
Multnomah County
Mary’s professional experiences include 34 years of service at Multnomah County delivering training, facilitation, coaching, and consulting within and across County organizations to groups and individuals through a variety of learning and skill building learning experiences and methods; as well as extensive experience with and service to the non-profit sector - domestic and sexual violence, HIV/AIDS, general social justice organizing efforts, culturally specific community development and support. She is a proud Asian American woman working locally, regionally, and nationally within Asian American Indigenous Pacific Island communities, and in allyship with communities of the global majority to survive and thrive.
Panel Host & organizer
erin stevanus (she/her)
erin is an artist, strategist, and social entrepreneur committed to unlocking the potential of complex systems through foresight and speculative thinking. She runs a design futures studio, collaborating with leaders across the private, public, nonprofit, and philanthropic sectors to bring to life not-too-distant futures. As the founder of an innovation platform, she support changemakers in design thinking and social entrepreneurship. In her creative practice, erin writes, composes, and performs works exploring speculative futures and the mindsets needed to navigate them. You can also find her facilitating deep listening experiences and crafting live digital soundscapes through the sonic sound lab project, which invites curiosity, exploration, and rest.
Special thanks to our sponsors
in partnership with StudioYellow
