All of the Above
Janette Komoda Kim


My work addresses climate justice by empowering communities to realize a more equitable distribution of land and resources. To address such complex issues, I often collaborate with community-based organizations and municipal agencies, and I combine tools of urban, architectural, and multimedia design.

Over the years, I’ve been drawn to approaches that I believe get to the roots of systemic change. One—decision-making tools—deals with the process of community empowerment.  The other—property reform—shapes the space of community life.

My decision-making tools help community members explore, imagine, and debate potential responses to complex urban issues in a healthy, playful way. For example, I designed three board games, called In It Together, Bartertown, and Mix & Match, which play out more just and equitable responses to wildfires and rising seas. I also wrote a book called The Underdome Guide to Energy Reform, which exposes the politics behind sustainable design, and I co-produced a podcast series called Safari, which gives subway riders a tour of urban animal life just outside their windows. I reflect on such methods by writing about public engagement. I advocate for more direct, collaborative governance by those who are most impacted by design. 

I also reimagine the space of property ownership. My goal is to foster regenerative economies and a more reciprocal relationship between people and land. In the Resilient by Design Challenge, for example, our team designed collectively-owned housing to protect communities from displacement due to sea level rise and gentrification. I also designed a hotel in Sichuan, China and a farmhouse in Sonoma, CA, where people can engage with bamboo and chapparal landscapes around them. I also research and write about exceptional community-based initiatives. I am currently writing a book called Property Playbook, which illustrates how activists and architects can co-opt property ownership to foster ecological vitality and repair the dispossession of land from workers and BIPOC people. 


These projects (and a few others) are also linked below. Please be in touch! 


Books

Property Playbook
The Underdome Guide to Energy Reform
 

Articles and Editorial    on Property
on Engagement
on Climate and Justice
on Energy
on Architectural Research
 


Building & Interior Design
Minsu
Farmhouse
Block Pantry
Pinterest Headquarters


Landscape & Urban Design
Resilient by Design Challenge
Fall Kill Master Plan 

National AIDS Memorial


Games & Mixed Media 
In It Together
Bartertown
Mix & Match
Safari


ExhibitionsSeoul Biennial
Oslo Biennial
YBCA


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National AIDS Memorial: Living Memorial 2005-7
This design was selected as a wining entry to an open international competition for a new feature at the National AIDS Memorial Grove in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. Our project, called “Living Memorial,” proposed a landscape of charred wood and a blackened steel poles as a counterpoint and complement to the existing verdant setting. of the Grove. Plants at the edges of the charred terrain would grow over time, to signal that mourning involves both loss and healing. The project was developed over two years and presented in community forums in a process that has been highlighted in the documentary feature film, The Grove.

Location
Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA
Status
Unbuilt
Design Team
Town/Kim Studio (Principals in charge: Janette Kim and Chloe Town).
Grants
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Brownsfellow Grant Travel Fellowship 
Recognition
Selected by International Jury: Toshiko Mori, Walter Hood, Mary Miss, Joseph RosaExhibition UC  Berkeley (2005), CCA (2005), SFMOMA pop-up (2005).
Published Reviews
The LeFevre Fellowship (2018), Emergent Memory (2006), Architectural Record (2005), Koeram Journal (2005), The Architect’s Newspaper (2005), The Associated Press (2005), The San Francisco Chronicle (2005).The Grove (2012).