Mapping Edges is a transdisciplinary research studio that explores the relationships between ecologies, people and the urban environment.
Welcome to the Mapping Edges universe.
ABOUT:
Mapping Edges specialises in place-based design research. We explore and amplify urban ecologies, at a time when the impact of climate change on our cities calls for a better understanding of the relations between people, nature, culture, and urban space
The ‘edges’ in our name refer to the idea of edge or ecotone as a transition zone between different ecosystems. Elements from these ecosystems make edges rich in biodiversity.
As researchers, we work at the ‘edges’ of research disciplines – design research, ethnography and history – and methodologies to cross-pollinate new ideas. We experiment with edges as transition zones between different ecosystems; interfaces between mediums, projects and processes on the margin of activities where it is possible to cross-pollinate and develop alternatives.
OUR TERMINOLOGY:
What are recombinant ecologies?
Recombinant ecologies are ecologies that only exist because of human intervention, either deliberate or inadvertent. In Sydney, for example, recombinant ecologies include the banana, papaya, and dragonfruit plants that populate suburban gardens and verges.
What are civic ecologies?
Civic ecologies are the result of deliberate, actions that make connections between people in a particular place. Community gardens, verges tended by residents, and seed exchanges are examples of civic ecologies. Civic Ecologies can make alliances between country, communities, individuals, organizations, local govt, plants, animals, soil, and water.
Our Projects
The Green Square Atlas of Civic Ecology (2021)
The Green Square Atlas of Civic Ecology aims to produce a map of the civic environmental practices happening within Sydney’s Green Square precinct.
Mapping Marickville (2018)
Marrickville Walks produced a series of print-on-demand booklets about the edible gardens of Marrickville. We explored this environmentally and culturally diverse suburb on foot.
PUBLICATIONS
The Green Square Atlas of Water Stories
The Green Square Atlas of Water Stories maps, materialises and activates social and environmental histories and practices of water in Green Square. We invite you to choose a portal through which you can enter the archives and flow through time and space. Be guided by a camellia, a pub sign and a dugong. Take a […]
DOWNLOAD pdfFrom photo documentation to photo diagrams: a technique to make civic ecologies present and legible
The visualization of nature in cities fundamentally impacts how we imagine the urban environment and our role in caring for it. Across Australia, the project of urban renewal imagines and designs specific typologies of urban nature. These typologies can obscure grass root forms of environmental stewardship and their connection through civic ecologies. Yet, at this […]
DOWNLOAD pdfOn Countermapping and codesigning with more-than-humans
This chapter is published in Feminist Designer, On the Personal and the Political in Design Edited by Alison Place, The MIT Press Book Details
DOWNLOAD pdfEdge
Published in Environmental Humanities, 2023, 15, (1), pp. 164-167, Duke University Press As a concept, edge has multiple intellectual genealogies, from ecology to business studies and cultural theory.1 In each field it has slightly different connotations, but it maintains a basic shared meaning: it signifies a transition zone between different systems. In this lexicon entry, we explore […]
DOWNLOAD pdfPlace-based methodologies for design research: An ethnographic approach
The debate about place has long intersected with design studies. Our contribution to interdisciplinary design is to facilitate a dialogue between design and human geography. Grounded in Doreen Massey’s conceptualisation of place as the interrelations of diverse powers, processes and practices, this paper combines ethnographic methods and examples into a succinct place-based methodology for design […]
DOWNLOAD pdfPlanty Design Activism: Alliances with Seeds
In cities across Australia and elsewhere, individuals and groups are experimenting with initiatives to link urban dwellers to local ecologies and strengthen the relation with and awareness of the environment. Community and street gardens, bush regeneration working bees, botanical and bird-watching expeditions in city parks and green areas are examples of this renewed interest in […]
DOWNLOAD pdfLATESTS POSTS
Ecological art can bring us closer to understanding nature. How does this look in the era of climate change? Topographies at Sydney College of the Arts Gallery. Jessica Maurer Alexandra Crosby, University of Technology Sydney Ecology has always fascinated Australian artists. Think of landscape painters like Arthur Boyd (1920–99), who was inspired by nature and committed […]
Haberfield Garden Competition 2024
Since our 2018 project documenting environmental stewardship practices in the gardeners of Haberfield, we have volunteered as judges of the Haberfield Association’s Garden Competition. This year we were looking at the category ‘Whole Gardens’. Presentation night was 22nd Monday, 2024 at the local library. Judges showcased the stunning entries to share the resilience, generosity and […]
PhD Scholarships available
PhD scholarships available with Mapping Edges as part of the ARC Discovery Project ‘Surfacing urban wetlands in two urban renewal sites in Sydney’ Fully funded for 3.5 years full time Email CV and cover letter to Alexandra.crosby@uts.edu.au by 8 April 2024. Successful applicants will join the research team sharing knowledge between partners, with milestones for […]
Following Sydney’s water: visualising socio-ecological relationships
We are absolutely thrilled to be starting on a new project in 2024. This Discovery Project is funded by the Australian Research Council. Wetlands are an endangered ecosystem globally. We aim to foreground, explore and reconnect with wetlands in Sydney. The project builds on research undertaken in Water Stories, using a similar methodology (including walkshops, […]
Pedal Set Go
Mapping Edges has collaborated with Pedal Set Go on a free Guided Ride of Water Stories. The tour is based on the living archive of Green Square. Professional guides show riders the bicycle friendly ways to explore Water Stories that maps the history and practices of water around Green Square. ‘Not only will you never […]
Mapping Edges at Livable Cities Conference
In June, we travelled to New York to present at the Livable Cities Conference, covering architecture, design, city planning, health, technology, urban economics and social policy. We presented our paper ‘Civic Ecologies in Green Square: Beyond urban renewal, towards caring for Country’ on a panel about Sustainability and Society.
Bell frogs, dugong bones and giant cauliflowers: water stories come to life at Green Square
Sheas Creek runs into Alexandra Canal. Photo: Ilaria Vanni, Author provided Ilaria Vanni, University of Technology Sydney; Alexandra Crosby, University of Technology Sydney, and Shannon Foster, University of Technology Sydney Did you know the Sydney suburb Rosebery was home to the now-endangered green and golden bell frogs? That enormous cauliflowers were nourished by fresh water […]
Water Stories: Exhibition, Walkshop and Rizzeria Workshop
107 Projects, Green Square, Joynton Avenue Creative Centre, Zetland. Join us at 107 to launch Water Stories, an exhibition of the archives as estuaries of Green Square. Joynton Avenue Creative Centre 3a Joynton Avenue Zetland, NSW 2017 Wed., 16 November 2022, 6:00 pm – 9:00 pm AEDT You can register here or just turn up Walkshop: 19 November […]
Launching the Water Stories website
Did you know there is habitat for endangered frogs in Rosebery? Did you know there was once a violent cauliflower gang roaming the streets of Waterloo? Did you know dugong bones were found during excavation for the Alexandra Canal? These little-told histories are surfacing this week with the launch of Water Stories, a collaborative research […]
‘May you always taste the sweetest fruit’
Ilaria Vanni Shannon Foster, University of Technology Sydney; Alexandra Crosby, University of Technology Sydney, and Ilaria Vanni, University of Technology Sydney Sydney’s Green Square is one of Australia’s biggest urban renewal projects. But it’s much more than a construction site. First Nations people know it by another name: nadunga gurad, or sand dune Country. For […]