Places That Heal – Free Masterclass with Tony Cho
Some places make you want to slow down, stay awhile, and connect with the people around you. Others seem built mainly to move you through as quickly as possible, with little attention to the qualities that make a street, building, park, or neighborhood feel meaningful.
Tony Cho approaches that difference through regenerative placemaking. His perspective centers on three decisions made before anyone starts drawing: how a place relates to nature, who from the community is involved, and whether the culture and story already present are carried forward.
You’ll explore how those principles show up in real projects, including ChoZen, the Climate & Innovation HUB in Little Haiti, and the Phoenix Arts & Innovation District in Jacksonville. Each example offers a different way to think about the places you encounter every day.
Tony will also look candidly at Wynwood, including what worked and what came at a cost. The result is a practical invitation to look more closely at a place you care about and consider what might help it feel more connected to land, people, and local identity.
Why Attend “Places That Heal”
The spaces around us shape how we move, gather, and relate to one another. When a place ignores its land, community, or local story, it can become somewhere people simply pass through rather than somewhere they feel connected to.
Tony Cho has spent twenty years working on places including Wynwood in Miami, Little Haiti, Jacksonville, and forty acres along the St. Sebastian River. That experience gives him concrete examples for examining what changes when nature, community, and culture are considered from the beginning.
The session also makes room for lessons from projects that did not unfold exactly as intended. Tony’s willingness to revisit Wynwood and discuss both what worked and what it cost offers a practical way to think about development without reducing placemaking to a simple success story.
What You’ll Learn
We’ll begin with Tony’s three-part framework of nature, community, and culture, so you can see why the most important placemaking decisions often happen before the first drawing is made. You’ll look at what is already happening on the land and what can be learned by paying attention before trying to impose a plan.
From there, you’ll explore the role of community, which means looking at who is in the room before design decisions are finalized and why Tony considers local people essential to the process. You’ll also examine culture, so that the history and identity already present in a neighborhood are not treated as obstacles to erase.
Along the way, Tony will connect those ideas to real places, and then use Wynwood as a candid case study in both achievement and consequence. The examples move from principles to practice so you can consider how the same questions might apply to your own street, building, neighborhood, or town.
- Why Tony begins with nature, community, and culture before design drawings take shape
- How existing shade, water, and the paths people already use can inform a plan
- Why ChoZen offers an example of allowing the land to help set the direction
- How involving a community before the first drawing changes the placemaking process
- What the Climate & Innovation HUB in Little Haiti illustrates about working with what already exists
- Why preserving a neighborhood’s story matters when shaping new places
- How the Phoenix Arts & Innovation District in Jacksonville connects place with local culture
- What Tony believes Wynwood got right and what its transformation cost
- How the three principles can give you a new lens for examining a place you care about
Who This Is For
This event is for people who care about where they live and want a more thoughtful way to understand why some places invite connection while others feel anonymous or disconnected. You can bring your attention to something as ordinary and immediate as your street, your building, your neighborhood, or your town.
You do not need a current project, professional background, or expertise in architecture or development. The session is relevant to renters and homeowners, parents, artists, neighbors, builders, and others interested in the relationship between land, community, culture, and the places people share.
- Renters curious about the qualities that make a neighborhood feel connected
- Homeowners thinking more deeply about their street or surrounding community
- Parents interested in the places where families and neighbors gather
- Artists attentive to culture, identity, and the stories carried by a place
- Neighbors who care about how change affects their community
- Builders interested in regenerative approaches to placemaking
- People without a project who simply want to understand their surroundings differently
About Tony Cho
Tony Cho has spent twenty years building and developing places, with work connected to the Wynwood Arts District in Miami, Magic City in Little Haiti, the Phoenix Arts & Innovation District in Jacksonville, and the ChoZen Center for Regenerative Living.
At the Phoenix Arts & Innovation District, a hundred-year-old warehouse became the Emerald Station, and 36 free events drew 5,000 people in a year. ChoZen encompasses 40 acres along the St. Sebastian River and reflects Tony’s interest in allowing the characteristics of the land to inform development.
Tony is the founder of Future of Cities, a regenerative real estate investment, development, and education platform focused on regenerative placemaking. He is also the author of Generation Regeneration.
In this session, he draws on both successful projects and more complicated lessons. His discussion of Wynwood focuses not only on what the district achieved, but also on what he believes its transformation got wrong and what that experience can teach about the consequences of placemaking decisions.
Endorsements
“the ideal blueprint for a blue zone.”
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- Sep 24 2026
- Expired!
- 9:00 am - 10:00 am
Local Time
- Timezone: America/New_York
- Date: Sep 24 2026
- Time: 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm
More Info
- Worldwide
