Stories & Beer with 5M and HUB Oakland on "Creating Place"

Welcome to our live broadcast of this month's "Stories & Beer" event from The HUB in Berkeley California.

This month, Nick Aster talks to Ashara Ekundayo from the HUB Oakland project and Andy Wang of Forest City.  Both of these organizations are involved in the wholesale transformation of entire city blocks into thriving ecosystems of conscious capitalism and cultural renewal.

In San Francisco, the 5M project, spearheaded by Forest City will develop a four-acre site (between 5th, Mission, and Howard Streets) to become a mix of low, mid, and high rise buildings for living, working, and playing.

HUB Oakland is the cornerstone of a similarly ambitious project in downtown Oakland.

Tonight we will talk about the details of both projects, but also how companies and organizations can collaborate to "create place" in society for the benefit of people, planet & profit.

UPDATE: Here's the video in case you couldn't make it last night.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5-v9Hk7vRWQ

Ashara Ekundayo

Ashara Ekundayo is an Oakland-based cultural worker of the urban landscape and has served as catalyst, curator, educator, and producer for more than 20 years. Through her company BluBlak Media Consulting, she has worked with local and national organizations to build capacity for increased community engagement through the uses of creative practice, exhibition, strategic communications design and project management. She is a serial entrepreneur and activist committed to social change, and has supported individuals and grassroots companies in the redesign of their brand strategy through permaculture principles and is an expert at negotiating collaborative space within the intersections of the public and private sector.

In 2009 Ashara was selected by the Ashoka Foundation and the City of Denver in the U.S. launch of the “Change Your City” Campaign as a social innovator “stimulating the green economy” being manifested through her local programmatic work in food justice and green jobs design, and has held Fellowship positions with the U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Educational & Cultural Affairs and Green For All.  She currently serves as the Marketing Director for the San Francisco Green Festival, is a member of the ”Future of Soul Think Tank” at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, is the STEAM Curriculum Developer for BlackGirlsCode.com, and is a burgeoning food blogger at ”Grits & Greens.”

Ashara is a member of the Founding Team for Hub Oakland opening in Fall 2013, follow her on Twitter @BluBlakwomyn