Karen Christensen is an author, publisher, and founder of Berkshire Publishing Group. Her forthcoming book with Ray Oldenburg revisits the idea of the “third place,” exploring how we build community in an age of loneliness and division.

Majora Carter is a real estate developer, strategist, and Peabody Award–winning broadcaster whose work has redefined urban revitalization. She is the author of Reclaiming Your Community, a book that challenges the idea that low-status neighborhoods are destined to remain so.

In this episode of The Sidewalk Ballet, we talk with Nate Storring, Co-Executive Director of Project for Public Spaces, about the organization’s 50th anniversary and the future of placemaking.

In this episode of The Sidewalk Ballet, we sit down with Kady to talk about placemaking as practice and possibility. From Placemaking class to her on-the-ground experience building community through culture, she shares how storytelling, celebration, and showing up shape the way we live together. It’s a conversation about creativity, access, and the small, artful moves that change the feel of a city.

Jay Pitter, MES, is an award-winning placemaker and author creating joyful public spaces that foster belonging, prosperity, and cultural memory. She advances this work through cultural planning, policy frameworks, and storytelling—bridging rigor and collective imagination to advance public joy as essential urban infrastructure and a human right

Mara Mintzer is co-founder and Executive Director of Growing Up Boulder, a child- and youth-friendly city initiative rooted in the University of Colorado Boulder’s Community Engagement, Design, and Research Center. She leads efforts to embed young people’s voices into city planning, writes and speaks internationally about participatory planning with youth, and helped launch projects in Boulder that put children’s perspectives at the heart of policies, parks, housing, and public safety.

JT Mudge is a futurist who helps organizations and communities imagine what’s next for cities, technology, and culture. From foresight sessions in Seoul to advising civic leaders across the globe, his work explores how we navigate uncertainty and design for possibility. On The Sidewalk Ballet, J.T. brings his perspective on emerging trends, the role of imagination in urban life, and what the future might hold for the places we share.

In this episode of The Sidewalk Ballet, we sit down with Dr. Christine Brooks to explore her new master’s program at CIIS, The Artful Path to Coaching and Community Building. Christine shares how the program was born from a desire to train leaders who think creatively, act with compassion, and build communities rooted in justice and belonging. Our conversation moves from the personal to the systemic — touching on wellness, imagination, and the art of helping people thrive together in complex times.