Virtual Colleagues Meetup:
Manifesto Talk & Workshop with BlackSpace

Monday, September 23, 11:30 a.m.- 1:00 p.m.

Workshop Notes
In September, about ten Colleagues organizations gathered for a virtual Manifesto Talk & Workshop with BlackSpace. Workshop facilitators Chopp Stewart, Dariella Freed, and Julia Jannon-Shields introduced us to the 14 principles in the BlackSpace Manifesto and provided examples of those principles in action. One example they shared was the Heritage Conservation Playbook that came out of their work with the community of Brownsville in Brooklyn. This playbook aims to provide guidance to practitioners both local and non-local, striving to collaborate with community members to document, conserve, and amplify Black neighborhood cultures.

From there, participants identified three principles from the Manifesto that most spoke to them. Facilitators then divided us into breakout rooms where we answered three questions surrounding one of the principles: (1) How has your work used this principle? (2) How has your work failed to use the principle? and (3) How do you want to push your work to use the principle? Finally, we all came back together to summarize our discussions. Click here to view the notes from those discussions.

While we hope these conversations and the principles articulated in the Manifesto sparked some new ideas and got us all thinking critically about how we engage with communities, we acknowledge that there is more work to be done.

Some of our key takeaways from the conversation and potential next steps:

• The facilitators noted that the Manifesto is an acknowledgement that not only what they do is important but how they do it. They use it to push their partners and work towards these ideals. How can we as preservationists apply these principles to the way we practice preservation across New York State?

• We may all be trying to push ourselves to be more inclusive in our work but how do we have accountability as a field/network?

• Deep listening occurs not just within community but also within ourselves.

• The facilitators recommended sitting with the Manifesto principles. They can be applicable to our general life as well as our work. We can use them in practice with each other. Even if we’re not empowered to make a policy change within our organization or the wider preservation field, we can make a change within ourselves and in our day-to-day interactions.

• In a follow-up email after the workshop, the facilitators noted:

  We were most struck by the fact that each group emphasized the need to prioritize listening to lived experiences, whether through direct input, understanding histories, or fostering self-determination within communities.

  How can we carry this priority into our everyday work?

Thank you to all the Colleagues who joined us and participated in an open and honest conversation. If you haven’t already, please take Blackspace’s feedback survey.

About the Workshop
The League has been selected for a NYSCA-funded workshop with BlackSpace, a collective of urbanists, planners, educators, designers, community organizers, and other preservation-adjacent professionals who collaboratively create projects, workshops, and experiences that center Black life in the built environment. BlackSpace will facilitate a virtual Manifesto Talk & Workshop for the Preservation Colleagues network. In this workshop, participants are introduced to the BlackSpace Manifesto and provided ways to apply its principles to their own current working dynamics. These workshops expand thinking about the possibilities for Black cultural presence in their organization’s internal or client projects.

BlackSpace facilitators will help us, as New York preservation colleagues, come up with values and shared language that can serve as the baseline for our work together, essentially adopting our own version of the BlackSpace Manifesto, which you can view here.

About BlackSpace
BlackSpace demands a present and future where Black people, Black spaces, and Black culture matter and thrive.

Since 2015, BlackSpace Urbanist Collective has worked to bridge policy, people, and place with a mission of equity and justice in the built environment. The group collaborates to create new modes of work that center equity and support conservation in Black communities. BlackSpace strives to unlearn traditional modes of urbanism, which have long excluded marginalized voices.

Learn more by exploring BlackSpace’s website, reading their Manifesto, and watching this 11-minute video.

Registration is closed

Registration is free and open to current Preservation Colleagues members. Please note that capacity is limited and will be capped at 45. For this reason, we ask that each organization limit attendance to 2 staff members.

We also ask that you only register if you are sure you can commit to attending the full workshop. If you need to cancel, please let us know right away so that we can free up a spot.

Click here to become a Colleagues member. Questions about the status of your membership or this event? Email Caitlin.