Growing NearWest: An Urban Community Gardens Pilot Project

Abstract

This is the story of the collaboration between Junior and Senior Visual Communication Design students, representatives from IUPUI’s Office of Neighborhood Partnerships and residents from four Near Westside neighborhoods in Indianapolis to develop, design and facilitate the creation of The Growing NearWest Urban Community Gardens Pilot Project: four distinct urban gardens in each of the four neighborhoods, creating a unique opportunity to foster community engagement, capitalize on existing assets, and build community capacity to address food access issues.

The Near Westside needed help in envisioning, planning, designing and building these gardens, as well as the creation of a solid foundation to ensure their continued success.

Within the senior-level "Designing People-centered Services" course at Herron School of Art and Design, IUPUI, the students conducted people-centered, participatory design research that included methods ranging from standard web and print-based exploration, to ethnographic research methods such as conducting contextual observation and interviews within the communities, and designing and facilitating engagements with community members using generative tools. This research informed the planning processes, design and development of the gardens.

This experience through applied service-learning gave the students the opportunity to transform the way the neighborhood residents viewed engagement, working together, and even issues around food access. The process and methodology enabled citizens to actively participate in the planning and creation of something that would positively impact their way of life. This experience also gave the instructor an opportunity to facilitate the collaboration between diverse stakeholders in both higher education and local communities.