Gabriela Rendón
Cooperative Housing Development and Neighborhood Initiatives
Community planning, equitable development, solidarity economies, community land trusts, women-led community practices, urban pedagogies, action research
Rendón (Mexico/New York, USA) is an urban planner committed to social and spatial justice with expertise in affordable housing, limited-equity cooperative housing, community planning, and advocacy. She is the director of the Housing Justice Lab, a platform for dialog, research and strategic design that advocates for equitable neighborhood development based at The New School in New York City. Gabriela is also the co-founder of Cohabitation Strategies, an international nonprofit organization committed to empowering communities through action-research and long-term community-driven projects. Cohabitation Strategies has been engaged in projects commissioned by nonprofit foundations, public agencies, municipalities, and national governments across cities in Western Europe, South America and North America.
Rendón has worked closely with immigrant women and low-income community groups building capacity, creating alliances, developing community plans, and implementing neighborhood initiatives. Some of her latest collaborative projects include Cooperative Housing Trusts: A Hybrid Tenure Model for New York City, commissioned by the Museum of Modern Art, and Playgrounds for Useful Knowledge, commissioned by the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program. Her work has been exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD), the 4th International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam, the Istanbul Design Biennial 2012, the Vienna Biennale 2015, the Portugal Triennial 2016, and the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA).
Rendón is an Assistant Professor of Urban Planning and Community Development at The New School in New York City. She has authored and co-edited publications on housing, cooperative urban practices, and neighborhood restructuring, the latest include Cities for or Against Citizens? Socio-Spatial Restructuring and the Paradox of Citizen Participation (Author, A+BE Series), Social Property and the Need of a New Urban Practice (Co-author, Taylor & Francis), and Cooperative Cities (Co-editor, Journal of Design Strategies). She is currently working on two books, Defiant Neighborhoods: Rise, Revitalization, and Gentrification of Immigrant Communities in Latinx Brooklyn (forthcoming, NYU Press) and Cohabitation Strategies: Thoughts and Actions for the Co-Producition of Social Space (forthcoming, ORO Editions).