Emi Webb

BDes Industrial Design

Emi is an industrial/communication designer consumed by the way social infrastructure can cultivate genuine community connections. She has worked on design teams across North America, Europe, and the Middle East to study diverse cities and their connections to the built environment. Outside of her work as a co-founder of Neighbour Lab, Emi is the Designer at the Island Health Innovation Lab pushing collaboration and creativity to the forefront of public design for health. She likes to bring diverse voices together in creative ways that promote happy and healthy societies. In between placemaking projects you can find her in the garage with her dad converting vintage cars into electric hotrods as she believes EV conversions are the most sustainable way to preserve the history of these cars while decreasing the environmental impact of the transportation industry.

Leah Karlberg

BA Human Geography

Graduate Certificate Urban Policy & Planning

CIP Candidate

Leah leads a variety of planning policy, community engagement, and placemaking work both at Happy Cities and as a co-founder of Neighbour Lab—implementing creative communication tools to facilitate dialogue. She has contributed to innovative planning processes across Metro Vancouver in sectors including municipal, non-profit, co-operative, and at the University of British Columbia. In particular, Leah is interested in using placemaking to spark dialogue and strengthen social connections, leading to resilient outcomes daily and in the face of a climate crisis. In her spare time, Leah likes to talk about earthquakes and explore new places on her bicycle.

Steph Koenig

BDes Industrial Design

Steph is always hungry: her appetite is constantly growing for fresh creative pursuits, tasty challenges, and really anything edible. For the past eight years, she has lived and learned in on the unceded territory of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Stó:lō and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations. On any given day she can be found prototyping new ways of crossing lines of difference with the Curiko community, sketching out her latest ideas for community spaces, or riding an bright yellow adult tricycle. Steph's creative pursuits all share a common thread: a deep curiosity for exploring diverse ways of connecting communities and engaging in difficult conversations. Her work addresses vital topics like disability bias and emergency preparedness.

Adele Therias

BA Geography Environment and Sustainability Minor in Urban Studies

MSc Geomatics

Adele is passionate about employing geospatial data analysis and modelling for climate adaptation and community resilience. She completed her B.A. in Environmental Geography at the University of British Columbia with a minor in Urban Studies. After co-founding Neighbour Lab in 2018, she was the founding Project Lead for CityStudio North Vancouver from 2019-2021. She is driven by working on projects at the intersection of environmental and social issues, and participated in interdisciplinary projects on unemployment and transportation in Williams Lake, food security in Surrey, and was fortunate to learn about sustainable development in Iceland and Chongqing (China). She graduated from the MSc Geomatics at the Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands) in June 2023 with a focus on satellite imagery and machine learning for agricultural monitoring, and is now excited to integrate her two worlds of geomatics and community-based projects!

Ryan Brown

BASc Civil Engineering
MArch

Ryan's bio is on the way!

Ana Mendez

BA Human Geography

Minor in Development & Sustainability

Certificate in Urban Studies

Ana brings a background in public engagement, communications and community development. She is particularly interested in the role of community engagement, social connections and emergency preparedness in strengthening collective resilience. She holds a Bachelors’ Degree in Human Geography and Urban Studies from Simon Fraser University. She has contributed to innovative initiatives such as Simon Fraser University’s Public Square, youth-led non-profit CityHive, and the food justice organization, Capital Region Food and Agriculture Initiatives Roundtable. Outside of her work with Neighbour Lab, Ana serves as Resilience Coordinator at Building Resilient Neighbourhoods, leading the Connect & Prepare program. This initiative supports groups of neighbors in learning, connecting, and taking action to strengthen community resilience. Born and raised in Mexico City, Ana holds her identity and lived experience closely, fuelling her fascination with cities and the nuanced relationships between people, place, and space.

Jenric Ng

BSc Biological Sciences
MSc Public Health

Jenric is curious about the intersection of community engagement, public health and urban design, and how we can improve the wellbeing of our communities. Her insatiable curiosity has transformed her into a multi-hyphenate, with skills in project management, design thinking and community engagement. She has a decade of experience in Canada and Singapore, working in both the public and private sectors, serving both rural and urban communities. Jenric is excited about building social infrastructure to facilitate informal social connections in communities. She thrives when she can co-design innovative, participatory sessions with stakeholders to gather collective wisdom, foster trust, and drive systemic change. Currently Jenric is a change management lead at the qathet Division of Family Practice, a SFU RADIUS health lab alumnus and an independent consultant. When not day dreaming about how places can become more inclusive and health promoting, Jenric scales mountains and offers s’mores to whoever will take them.

Ash Wilson

Visual Arts Diploma 

Ash Wilson (she/her) is an artist, designer and illustrator and resides on the traditional territory of the Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ people, in Ucluelet, BC. She holds a diploma in Visual Arts from Camosun College and has exhibited her work in Canada and the United States. Ash specializes in synthesizing broad ideas into minimal succinct form, both in her art practice and through her work as a brand designer. She is especially interested in how seemingly inconsequential design choices can have a big impact, and leverages her curiosity and sensitivity to harness and illuminate their significance. Outside of her creative practice, you can find Ash out in nature both on land and under water - exploring, foraging and gathering inspiration.

Molly Rose

BA Economics & Sociology
MSc Urban Studies

Molly works as a community planning consultant and focuses on fostering meaningful neighbourhood connections to help address a range of societal challenges including loneliness, social isolation, emergency preparedness, natural disaster recovery, and climate action. She holds a Master of Science in Urban Studies from the 4Cities Euromaster program in which she studied social innovation in refugee housing in Vienna, Austria. Inspired by her favourite public spaces in Berlin and Copenhagen, Molly is keen to help create a more active and engaging urban environment in her hometown Victoria BC, and volunteers to organize community projects in public spaces to promote relationship-building and connection to place. Molly loves cities, but she is also known to occasionally disappear on multi-month hikes in the mountains.