We hear a lot about food deserts that impact many of our urban communities throughout the United States. At Urban Patch we are developing an initiative that will take on this critical issue with our local community and local farmers. As we develop the program we hope to make a real and immediate impact on […]
Interdependence consist of one large star sculpture (six interlocking pieces) in a small urban pocket park located in Indianapolis. Interdependence is meant to provoke people to see and appreciate the invisible people and places in their lives—those people and places we encounter every day but are invisible to us. The quiet kid in school, the […]
We recently helped create and install a new urban art project at the Forest Manor Service Center with United Way of Central Indianapolis’ #GenNow leadership volunteers.
We have a small harvest of black walnuts! Black walnut trees are beautiful and very valuable. Walnut trees produce delicious nutmeats and the tree’s timber are in high demand. A mature tree can yield 50K or more. Black walnut trees are a goldmine. Black walnut veneer — attractive and durable […]
Re-Booting the Inner City: New Partnerships for Historic Preservation October 31, 2013, 8:15am-1:15pm Urban communities often suffer from the demolition of historic structures and incompatible development. How do preservation-based strategies play out in the communities they are designed to improve? You’ll hear from residents in Indianapolis’ Mapleton-Fall Creek area on the innovative partnerships and grassroots strategies […]
In 1954 the U.S. Congress funded the Board of Fundamental Education, an innovate public-private partnership based in Indiana, New York, and Texas. The document excerpt below gives a summary of their model — one that we might consider recovering for the challenges that we still face today. Click on the images to enlarge. […]
Urban Patch is proud to announce that we will be leading TWO sessions at the upcoming 2013 National Preservation Conference in Indianapolis. We will lead a field session in our own Mapleton Fall Creek community highlighting the role of historic preservation in community redevelopment and partnerships. New Partnerships Re-Boot the Inner City Older neighborhoods that have suffered long-term economic and […]
Urban Patch has helped to start the Saint Nicholas Miracle Garden in Harlem. During Earth Week the group of community members received their approval to turn a vacant city-owned lot into one of the city’s newest Green Thumb sites, and had their first work day cleaning up the garden. The site is small (like everything in […]
Urban Patch has been working with community members and 596 Acres to create a new community garden in Central Harlem in New York City. The garden is currently a vacant city-owned site, but new garden member Vaughn Wallace found some research that the site was a garden over fifty years ago and was, in fact, the […]
Every year, ioby awards the Heroes In Our Backyards awards to those ioby project leaders that exemplify the ioby spirit of community activism. ioby Heroes In Our Backyards are hyper-local, community-based, entrepreneurial and tireless. In 2012, we awarded three groups with this award around the key tool for revitalizing urban centers: reimagining vacant space. The […]
