Good Ideas Need a Place to Sit

Park benches, campus gardens and informal gathering spaces remind us that placemaking begins with people, not expensive infrastructure.

👤 Arts Incubator Winnipeg 🕒 31 Oct 2026 💬 0 comments

When people talk about community development, the conversation often turns to buildings, equipment and large projects. Those things matter, but so do the modest spaces that support everyday social life. Seating, paths, shade and planting can make it easier for people to meet, talk and spend time outdoors. These are practical investments in how a place functions, and they can create opportunities for community activities without requiring an elaborate setup.

What Athabasca University’s outdoor spaces got us thinking about community, creativity and placemaking.

There we were, visiting Athabasca University last weekend, and what caught our attention first? Not a lecture hall. Not a research lab. Not even a coffee shop. Park benches!

We have a soft spot for places like these. Give us a picnic table, a quiet corner of a garden or a bench with a good view, and we’re happy. Some of our projects have started in exactly these kinds of places, with people chatting, tossing around ideas and wondering what might be possible if someone actually gave those ideas a try.

That’s placemaking for us. It’s about making places where people want to spend time, where conversations happen naturally and where people feel comfortable contributing something of their own. Sometimes that means rethinking an underused corner, adding a few seats, planting a garden or finding a better way to bring people together. It doesn’t have to involve a major construction project or a huge budget. Often, the smallest changes make a place feel more welcoming and give people a reason to return.

We’re interested in what happens when ordinary spaces become part of the community’s creative infrastructure. A bench can be a meeting place. A picnic table can become a temporary studio. A garden can bring together people who might never have worked on a project together otherwise. These spaces give ideas somewhere to land, and they make participation feel a little less formal and a lot more accessible.

We loved wandering around Athabasca University’s campus. The mature trees, outdoor seating areas and landscaped gardens made it easy to slow down and take a closer look at how the grounds were put together. We came away with a few ideas of our own, particularly for the living lab expansion in Melgund Township, where our gardening season is now winding down. It’s always useful to see how other places make room for people to gather, enjoy the outdoors and spend time together.

A big thank you to Athabasca University, the Graduate Students’ Association and the Faculty of Graduate Studies for hosting such an engaging graduate student conference. The welcoming atmosphere, the conversations and the work shared by participants made the gathering a memorable one. We were glad to be there, meet new people and spend some time getting to know the campus, too.

And as for those park benches? We’ll keep looking for them wherever we go. You never quite know what a good place to sit might lead to.

Article Contributor

Arts Incubator Winnipeg

The Arts Incubator - Winnipeg is a participatory arts collective and living lab, based in Winnipeg, Manitoba and Northwestern Ontario. It's a space where innovation and creativity thrive. It's latest iteration was launched in 2021 with funding and support from the Canada Council for the Arts Digital Greenhouse. Today, working with students and faculty from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, we fuse traditional and participatory media arts with artificial intelligence, music, storytelling and community-driven, land-based artist residencies to cultivate new voices and bold ideas. Whether through collaborative projects or immersive experiences, our small but vibrant community supports creators to explore, experiment, and connect. Join us at the intersection of artistry, technology, culture and community—where every moment is a new opportunity to create.

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