Omaha Or Bust.

Yesterdays post was a strategic segue into my looming trip to Omaha today. I'm so excited. I enjoy going to Omaha like some people enjoy going to exotic, far away places. Omaha is a vacation for me. It happens to contain all my favorite things in concentration. Not to mention the abstract beauty of the place.

I'm making the trip this weekend for an exciting event. I helped begin a design speaker series there: daOMA (design alliance Omaha). It's obvious that architects are involved in an endeavor when the capitalization of letters are 'creatively' organized. Our first speaker is debuting on Thursday, October 4, Mr. Bruce Mau. He will be followed by Thom Mayne in the spring, which will fortunately warrant another plane ride for yours truly. I'm most looking forward to the opportunity to show Mr. Mau around the small but mighty City of Omaha. I have always believed that anyone who can set aside their preconceptions long enough to actually end up in Omaha are somehow 'special, chosen' people. That's how utterly cool I think the place is. And it's still a bit of a secret, except for the rather large New York Times article written awhile back by Omahan Kurt Andersen, purveyor of NPR's art radio show Studio 360. As a result, there has been a small flood of NYC fashion editors, artists, and musicians relocate to Omaha to get in on a piece of the action. This has some locals worried about things like gentrification and rent prices. I think it's exciting.

We believe this speaker series has the potential to take the Omaha design community to the next level, hopefully leaving behind a superficial and stylistic formalism that has plagued it for years. Hopefully the discourse created by the group is able to jump between scales and utimately lead the discussion surrounding it's future urbanism.