WE DESIGN & BUILD BETTER COMMUNITIES
DownCity Design empowers people to imagine and create better futures for their community, using the tools of design.
Since our founding in 2009, more than 3100 young designers have celebrated the unveiling of more than 125 youth-designed, youth-built public projects in the city of Providence over the past decade.
At the Peace and Plenty Oasis ribbon cutting, our young designer Nicholas gazed in awe at the rainwater collection and shade structure his team had created for a community garden. “We built this!” Nick exclaimed. “There was nothing here before, just dirt and rocks. There was nothing. We made this from nothing!”
This is power—the power of creation.
“I realized that we were building something for my community — for other people of color and for youth. This was impact!”
- Nick Ong, DCD Alum & Educator
Currently, our 14 free youth programs engage 250 underserved teens annually in creating structures and graphics for public spaces. Our programs help participants develop essential skills and habits of mind like collaboration, communication, creative problem solving, and persistence. With more than half of our youth identifying as female, 91% as BIPOC, and 84% coming from low-income households, DownCity Design is working towards a more diverse and inclusive future for design.
From our very first day, we’ve seen that design challenges awaken a power in students that’s asleep all day in school: the power to create change. Taking a project from design to creation develops a whole range of hands-on skills. But the most important lessons are habits of mind and work – skills our alumni can apply anywhere, and for the rest of their lives.