Boston 2020 Annual Meeting Recap

Every year we make one of our quarterly Board of Directors meetings open to our community for transparency and collaboration with our audience.

On January 22, 2020 we welcomed attendees to our 2nd Annual Meeting. Last year we decided to make one of our quarterly board meetings open to the public to be transparent with our community of supporters. This year we popped-up at the Red Thread Steelcase Work Life Center in Boston’s Seaport with a full program highlighting what CoDesign Collaborative Boston has in store for 2020.

Board member Ashley Welch kicked things off with a welcome and introduced Executive Director Sam Aquillano who unveiled a preview of our new Strategic Plan. The Plan is the result of over a year of strategic conversations between staff, board, council, and community — looking back on 10 successful years and setting us up for many years of success and impact to come. It outlines 10 Strategic Priorities, 5 around programming and 5 around internal infrastructure — it also lists strategic investments we aim to make over the next five years. You can download a PDF of the card we shared with attendees outlining our strategic priorities and investments here.

Board member Leila Mitchell and our Exhibitions Manager, Amanda Hawkins, talked about the exhibitions we had on-view in 2019, including Extraordinary Playscapes, Bespoke Bodies: The Design & Craft of Prosthetics, and We Design: People. Practice. Progress. Amanda also talked about how we plan to meet our exhibitions strategic priority of having at least one exhibition on-view at all times around the city throughout the year, by designing our exhibitions to be modular, utilizing mobile exhibition elements, and partnering with more venues across Boston.

Board member Tom Di Lillo and our Vice President, Liz Pawlak, presented our financials from the 2019 fiscal year. Liz announced that in fiscal year 2020 we will be a $1 million nonprofit organization and shared the breakdown of revenue and expenses from 2019. Liz also announced that we will launch a Kickstarter campaign on February 11 to raise $30,000 in 30 days in support of Design Museum Magazine. The campaign will support growing distribution nationwide, adding more content to the magazine, improving print quality, and providing digital access to subscribers. If we raise $9,000 in the first 24 hours, Kickstarter will feature our project — you can pledge now before the campaign begins to ensure that happens.

Lastly, board member Kathy McMahon discussed the importance of marketing and communications for CoDesign Collaborative’s future — she now leads our new Communications Committee. Kathyt brought Sam up again for another big announcement: Sam unveiled the new CoDesign Collaborative website and gave a virtual tour.

The program finished with Sam awarding three Distinguished Service Medals. As a nonprofit, we rely on the support of our community and of individuals willing to give their time, money, and expertise in service to our mission to bring the transformative power of design everywhere. The Distinguished Service Medal was awarded to David and Felice Silverman, Principals at Silverman Trykowski Architects; and Meghan Allen, Corporate Account Executive at Tarkett. We’re grateful for the amazing service and support of Meghan, David, and Felice over our 10-year history as board members, council members, sponsors, supporters and more.

Distinguished Service Medal recipients with our Executive Director. Left to right: Meghan Allen, Corporate Account Executive at Tarkett; Sam Aquillano, Executive Director, CoDesign Foundation; Felice and David Silverman, Principals at Silverman Trykowski Architects.