The Dear Bakersfield Project provides residents of Bakersfield, California an accessible way to tell stories about their city and to their city. In partnership with the Kern Economic Development Corp. and the Bakersfield Museum of Art, Public Design Agency (PDA) created a means for personal and collective narrative collection and expression by way of place-based storytelling and postcards.
Through an city-wide open call for photographs, art, and stories of Bakersfield, we developed eight original postcard designs, two public activations, and an interactive exhibition at the Bakersfield Museum of Art where people come to write to the city and one another about Bakersfield's past, present, and future.
In collaboration with Bakersfield born filmmaker Fabian Euresti, PDA developed a documentary film capturing the Project. Dear Bakersfield was a 2019 AIA Emerging Professionals: Design For Equity Awardee.
