Growing the field of indigenous design
Learn the principles, processes, and practices that have shaped Tawaw’s approach to Indigenous Design over more than a decade of community-based work.
Indigenous Design is a growing field, yet many architects, planners, landscape architects, and designers were never formally taught how to engage with Indigenous communities in meaningful ways.
Developed from Tawaw’s Indigenous Placekeeping Framework™, these five online modules share the knowledge, methodologies, and practical approaches that guide our work. Grounded in lived experience and community collaboration, each module offers real-world insights that practitioners can apply to projects across disciplines.
Whether you’re beginning your learning journey or looking to deepen your practice, these modules are designed to build understanding, strengthen relationships, and support more thoughtful design outcomes.
The Role of Indigenous Knowledge in the Built Environment
Rethinking where design knowledge comes from
Design does not begin with a drawing. It begins with knowledge.
This module explores Indigenous knowledge as a living, relational system that moves through people, land, story, observation, and shared experience. Rather than treating knowledge as information to be collected, it introduces designers to ways of learning that are grounded in relationship, responsibility, and reciprocity.
Developed for architects, planners, landscape architects, designers, and project leaders, the module connects Indigenous ways of knowing to practical design decisions. Through research, reflection, case studies, and Tawaw’s Indigenous Placekeeping Framework™ (IPKF), participants will examine how knowledge can shape process, authorship, material choices, site relationships, and long-term cultural continuity.
Engagement for Indigenous Design
Beyond consultation. Toward meaningful participation.
Architecture is shaped by relationships long before it is shaped by drawings.
This module explores engagement as a collaborative design practice that builds trust, reveals cultural priorities, and transforms community knowledge into meaningful design outcomes. It introduces Tawaw’s evolving approach to Indigenous engagement, including Validation, a respectful process that builds upon knowledge communities have already shared while reducing engagement fatigue.
Developed for architects, planners, landscape architects, designers, and project leaders, the module provides practical guidance for planning culturally responsive engagement, working with advisory groups, navigating Indigenous protocols, and translating community narratives into design through Tawaw’s Indigenous Placekeeping Framework™ (IPKF). Participants will gain tools to move beyond consultation toward genuine co-authorship in the design process.
Place-Based Research for Indigenous Design
Learning to read place before shaping it
Design does not begin with a blank site. It begins within a living cultural, ecological, and historical context.
This module introduces Place-Based Research as a foundation for culturally informed design. Rather than treating research as the collection of background information, it invites practitioners to build familiarity with the Nations, stories, landscapes, architectural traditions, materials, and knowledge systems connected to a place.
Developed for architects, planners, landscape architects, designers, and project leaders, the module provides a structured approach to researching Indigenous contexts with care and accountability. Through practical examples, reflective questions, and Tawaw’s Indigenous Placekeeping Framework™ (IPKF), participants will examine land acknowledgment, local Nations, material culture, storied landscapes, Indigenous knowledge systems, ethnobotany, and ecological relationships. The goal is to move from information gathering toward cultural fluency, stronger relationships, and design decisions grounded in the specific meaning of place.
Engaging Landscape Architecture from an Indigenous Perspective
Designing landscapes as living relationships
Landscape architecture extends beyond shaping land. It is an opportunity to strengthen relationships between people, place, ecology, and culture.
This module explores how Indigenous worldviews inform landscape architecture through stewardship, reciprocity, and place-based design. Participants will examine landscapes as living systems that carry memory, support ecological processes, and sustain cultural practices across generations.
Designed for landscape architects, architects, planners, urban designers, and environmental professionals, the module provides practical strategies for integrating Indigenous ecological knowledge into contemporary design. Through case studies, reflective exercises, and Tawaw’s Indigenous Placekeeping Framework™ (IPKF), participants will learn how to work collaboratively with Indigenous communities, artists, Elders, and Knowledge Keepers while creating landscapes that foster biodiversity, cultural continuity, and meaningful connections between people and the land.
Co-Design for Indigenous Design
Transforming community knowledge into built form
Co-design is where Indigenous knowledge, values, and priorities become architecture. It is more than consultation. It is a collaborative process that shares authorship, ensuring that community voices continue to shape decisions from the earliest concepts through construction.
This module explores how co-design creates transparent, culturally grounded design processes that honor Indigenous governance, strengthen relationships, and protect cultural intent as projects evolve. Participants will learn practical tools for collaborative decision-making, design governance, visual communication, and documenting shared knowledge while working alongside Elders, Knowledge Keepers, Youth, artists, and community members.
Designed for architects, landscape architects, planners, project managers, engineers, and public-sector professionals, the module provides practical strategies for embedding Indigenous Design Drivers into spatial planning, materials, landscapes, and technical design. Through the Indigenous Placekeeping Framework™ (IPKF), participants will learn how collaborative design creates places that reflect community priorities, support cultural continuity, and foster lasting relationships between people, place, and the built environment.
Instructor.
Instructor.
Wanda Dalla Costa
Wanda Dalla Costa is a member of the Saddle Lake Cree Nation in Northern Alberta and brings 30 years of experience working with communities across North America. She is the first, First Nations woman to be licensed to practice architecture in Canada and the Principal of Tawaw Architecture Collective Inc. located in Phoenix, Arizona and Calgary, Alberta. Back in 2010, she created the Indigenous Placekeeping Framework™ a highly collaborative approach that aims to enlarge the community’s role in the planning and designing of urban and rural environments.