team — Place/Setting

Gabriel Mugar

Co-FOUNDER

Gabriel is a researcher and activist working at the intersection of technology, media, and community building. He is a research associate and affiliate faculty at the Emerson College Engagement Lab where he coordinates a national study on civic media practitioners and teaches courses on qualitative research and digital media studies. Gabriel earned his PhD from the Syracuse University School of Information Studies where his dissertation research looked at the newcomer management strategies of digital participatory platforms and how newcomers negotiate such strategies. He is the founder of the Transformative Culture Project, a Boston-based nonprofit that supports career development for young media professionals across southern New England, and is an affiliate of the Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University.

Anda French

Co-FOUNDER

Anda French received a B.A. in Architecture from Barnard College, Columbia University and a Master of Architecture from Princeton University. She has taught at Syracuse University, the New Jersey Institute of Technology and in the Barnard + Columbia Undergraduate Architecture Program. Anda’s teaching and design research focuses on civic engagement, collaboration and architectural representation, and has been funded by an Imagining America Grant for Artists and Scholars in Public Life. She is a founding principal of the design firm French 2D and a registered Architect in Massachusetts.

Jenny French

Co-FOUNDER

Jenny French is a founding principal of French 2D and a Design Critic in Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Her focus in both practice and teaching deals with the intersection of architecture with issues of identity, representation, storytelling, and engagement. Jenny French received a BA at Dartmouth College and a Master of Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. She is a recipient of Harvard’s Julia A. Appleton Traveling Fellowship and has been a visiting artist at the American Academy in Rome. French has taught at Northeastern University, Tufts University, and the Boston Architectural College. Her design research on site visits to unbuilt architecture has been exhibited at the Harvard GSD and is included in the Cornell Journal of Architecture, Issue 10: Spirits.