I’m working on Vivid Sydney for the fourth time, and this year, in a new and really exciting role. I’m the Director of Vivid Ideas Exchange (which I’ll be able to talk about in more detail soon), an action-packed 18 day industry & public program dedicated to creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship.

We’ve just opened a call for expressions of interest – if you have an event you’d like to share with our audience or an idea for discussion, check out the EOI form on the Vivid Sydney website or get in touch by February 28. It’s a short call-out period, get in touch if you have a kernel of an idea and we can talk it through.

Check out the podcast here.

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My Northern Hemisphere adventures are nearing an end, and what better reason to return to Sydney than to meet one of my heroes? Charles Landry, father of the creative cities movement, has been invited to deliver a keynote address by the City of Sydney on November 2.

I’ve been invited to join the panel discussion alongside some of my favourite Sydney thinkers (and a few Creative Sydney participants); Dr James Bradfield Moody, Executive Director, Development, CSIRO; Emile Sherman, Producer, See-Saw Films; Roderick Simpson, Associate Professor in Urban Design, University of Sydney, Principal, Simpson + Wilson Architecture + Urban Design; and Dr Rodney Tolley, Conference Director, Walk21.

More info on the event here: tickets are free on registration.

Check out my cool gallery.

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And whyshould we try to? I’m in New York City for a few months working on finding my own answers to these questions.

It’s pretty overwhelming. I’m doing a lot of research, raiding New York’s brilliant public libraries and going to as many urban issues talks I can find.

The more I read, the bigger the picture gets, and the more I start to doubt my ability to answer these questions. So it’s been wonderful to immerse myself in What We See: Advancing the Observations of Jane Jacobs, a wonderful, new-ish (2010) collection of essays edited by Stephen A Goldsmith and Lynne Elizabeth.

I only came across Jacobs a few years ago, and like many others, her way of thinking – or rather, her way of seeing the city – was a revelation. Her genius was not in academic dissections, and her work didn’t take the form of the impenetrable, abstract explorations of the architecture journals I’m wading through. Her genius was in recognising the importance of simple interactions, in seeing the value embedded in the streets, shops, stoops and park benches she walked past every day.

Like Jane, I’m not an architect, a planner, or an academic. But I am an ambler, a dawdler, an eavesdropper and bench-warmer. I linger in the park and look in the windows of the bodegas and delis. I want to train myself to see like Jane Jacobs. My favourite essay in the book is by Daniel Kemmis, “Cities and the Wealth of Places”, in which he quotes Jane as she revealed the secret of her observational genius.

“As Gail recounted it, Jane said, “Well, I have a secret. Whenever I visit a new city, I take a companion with me.”

“A companion,” Gail said. “anybody in particular?”
“Yes,” Jane responded, “I ask Benjamin Franklin to walk with me. You see, everything is new to him, but he’s so curious and so intelligent, and so he always asks questions that I have to think pretty hard about before I try to answer. That helps me see deeper into the city than I would otherwise have done.”

As I walk the streets, and wade through the reams of writing about them, I’m hoping to be guided by Jane’s spirit and her inquisitive eye. Assume nothing, take nothing as gospel, and look for what really works – on the street.

PEDESTRIAN Q&A WITH JESS SCULLY from PEDESTRIAN.TV on Vimeo.

Thanks to Ash for the great interview!

Big thanks to Lisa Cahill for the invitation to participate, and to the many excellent people I met today.

An awesome art, design and illustration magazine I edited in around 2006 – 2008. Don’t ask me to be specific, it’s all a bit blurry. Published by the brilliant cats at Design is Kinky, this one is still going strong (just without all those pesky words, now).

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