Celebrating our 30th anniversary, 2025 was a packed year for the Design Trust. We are so grateful for the people that make up our community and fill NYC’s public spaces with life and culture. Here are a few of our favorite places and moments from a year in public space:

• Water, NYC’s sixth borough: We launched our 12th call for project ideas this year on the theme of Water. As New Yorkers submitted their visions for amore equitable water future, we explored the city’s waterways and water resources through public talks, public space potlucks, and an exhibition & youth photography workshops at Pier 57 with Nathan Kensinger on expanding and protecting waterfront access. 

• Connecting public housing & public space: This year, we opened a newcommunity space designed by and for New York City Housing Authority residents in the Lower East Side. This work inspired four resident-led projects with the Public Housing Community Fund in Brooklyn and the Bronx, including ribbon-cuttings this year of NYCHA’s first dog park at Castle Hill Houses and a new basketball courtfor the Patterson Houses. We released a toolkit to help NYC’s public housing residents bring open space improvements like these to their own backyards, and a national convening of public housing authorities with the Trust for Public Land to scale this work across the country.

• Rethinking access to the city: Our city is at its best when it's public for all. The Untaped project examined the red-taped regulatory barriers that are severely limiting local organizations’ ability to activate and use public spaces for community programming, like block parties, performances, and beyond, and is working to propose solutions for the new mayoral administration that can simplify the existing unwieldy maze of permitting and insurance requirements. The Neurodiverse City unveiled two prototypes exploring how sensory design can improve the accessibility of plazas and playgrounds and inspire policy change, and we continued our partnership with the Macaulay Honors College at CUNY, creating internship opportunities for New York students and access to jobs in the urban planning and design sectors.

• Reimagining sites of memory: In partnership with the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance and community engagement with Bronx residents, we announced a Design Ideas Competition to re-imagine the Enslaved African Burial Ground at Van Cortlandt Park.

• A new era for the public realm: In response to shifting national pressures and funding cuts, we joined the Public Design Alliance, a coalition of architecture and city leaders working together to activate the public realm and make the city a better place to live. In November, a record number of New Yorkers showed up to vote for New York City’s future with a similar drive. Our mission—to unlock the potential of NYC’s public spaces—is a broad mandate to improve the livability of the five boroughs. This new year, we are committed to working with and holding accountable a new administration that has the potential to make public life more accessible, affordable, and abundant!