"Of all of society's institutions, education has brought us to the current state of poor relations between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples; but if it is education that created this mess, it will be education that will get us out of it."
— The Honourable Murray Sinclair
These words from the late Honourable Murray Sinclair offer a way of thinking through the themes of the 2026 Quality in Canada's Built Environment Convention. Members of our 91 research team attended the convention as part of our Night-time Design with/for Marginalized Communities project, joining researchers, architects, planners, students, Elders, Knowledge Keepers, and community leaders from across Canada in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Hosted by the University of Manitoba under the theme Re-Visioning Quality Through Kinship, the gathering centered Indigenous approaches to place and relationality in conversations about the future of the built environment. At the heart of the convention was an invitation to reconsider how quality itself is understood. Bringing together attendees from architecture, planning, and design, the convention explored how different ways of knowing might reshape the values, relationships, and responsibilities that guide the making of our communities. This, in turn, opened up questions about kinship and the possibilities that emerge when relationships become a guiding principle for community life.
Gathering in Winnipeg, Treaty One Territory, the home and traditional lands of the Anishinaabe (Ojibwe), Ininew (Cree), Dakota peoples, and the Red River Métis, we were welcomed into a learning environment grounded in relational and place-based Indigenous teachings. This placed Indigenous-settler reconciliation and accountability at the centre of our conversations, shaping what was discussed and how we were invited to learn from one another. This understanding was reflected in the teachings of Elder Albert Marshall of Eskasoni First Nation, who introduced us to Etuaptmumk, or Two-Eyed Seeing. This teaching encourages us to draw on the strengths of both Indigenous and Western knowledge systems, fostering a relationship between different ways of knowing for the benefit of all. Looking with both eyes offers a richer understanding of the world around us, revealing not only what we see but the relationships that give it meaning. Participants were encouraged to understand “kinning” as a framework through which humans, non-human beings, communities, and places relate to one another. We were invited to consider land as a relative to whom we hold responsibilities, a kin that we have been granted the voice and duty to advocate for.
A central aim of the convention was to elevate student voices and create opportunities for meaningful dialogue through intergenerational learning. The opening roundtable exemplified the convention's commitment to relational learning by bringing together Knowledge Keepers, Elders, Indigenous planners, and Architecture students in a shared conversation that honoured both lived experience and emerging perspectives. This exchange reinforced the idea that quality is strengthened when the people who inhabit, use, and care for our communities are included in conversations about their future.
Locating Ourselves
One of the teachings that resurfaced throughout the convention was a simple yet profound set of questions associated with the late Murray Sinclair’s teachings: Who are you? Where are you from? Where are you going? These questions challenged us to locate ourselves relationally. Rather than focusing our understanding of each other solely through our professions, we were equally invited to understand ourselves through our relationships to family, community, land, ancestors, and future generations. One of the convention's first acts was an introduction from Shirley Delorme, an Indigenous librarian intern at the University of Manitoba, who situated herself through her family relationships as a Métis and Anishinaabekwe woman while also situating participants on Red River Métis lands. This opening gesture established the relational methodology that would guide the convention, grounding ourselves in our relationships, the places we come from, and our responsibilities to both. A tree cannot flourish if it does not know the soil from which it grows. Likewise, meaningful relationships to place require understanding and context to thrive. If quality in the built environment is understood through kinship, then the measure of a space lies in the relationships it nurtures. Quality becomes a question of who is cared for, whose presence is valued, and how responsibilities to one another are made visible in the places we create.
Learning on the Land
Many of the convention's most compelling ideas converged on its second day. We travelled to the Makate Waagamichiwanang Gakinaa'amaatiwin Youth and Family Wellness Camp for a day of land-based learning. For me, this relocation served to challenge assumptions about where knowledge is produced and who produces it. While the convention was hosted within a university setting, it challenged familiar assumptions about how learning occurs. In many ways, the day embodied what the convention had been discussing. As an Indigenous student attending the conference, one of the most meaningful aspects of the convention for me was not simply hearing these ideas discussed but witnessing them enacted. Rather than only speaking about relationality, we practiced it. Shared meals, land-based learning, and opportunities for interdisciplinary exchange fostered the relationships and sense of community that the gathering sought to cultivate. Throughout the day, we learned from and listened to Elders, Knowledge Keepers, scholars, community leaders, and youth. By resituating ourselves within an Indigenous framework, listening became a central part of the learning process, opening possibilities for greater understanding across different ways of knowing.
One of the most memorable experiences involved creating beaded strawberry pouches while listening to a story about two brothers, grief, forgiveness, and healing. Following the death of one brother, a strawberry emerges from his grave. When the surviving brother eats the berry, the sorrow that had consumed him begins to lift. What made this activity powerful was the way it wove together storytelling, material practice, land, memory, and care. We did not simply hear a story but held it in our hands. We tasted it and carried it with us. The act of beading became a reminder that futures are woven through the relationships we choose to cultivate. If reconciliation is to shape the future of our communities, it must be carried forward through the practices, responsibilities, and acts of care that we embed in the places we create.
Implications for the Night-time Design for Marginalized Communities Project
The ideas explored throughout the convention also prompted reflection on our own research and design practices. For our Spatial Justice cluster, the emphasis on kinship, relationship-building, and multiple ways of knowing offered valuable frameworks through which to reconsider our Night-time Design for Marginalized Communities project. Much of this work examines how marginalized communities experience the city after dark, engaging questions of sleep equity, homelessness, queer nightlife, protest, public assembly, and urban care. Our takeaways from the convention reinforced the importance of creating spaces where lived experience can inform design conversations. For our project, this means approaching research as an opportunity to engage with the experiences and forms of expertise held by those whose relationships to our city are often overlooked.
Final Thoughts
For me, as a Cree-Métis student and member of 91's Night-time Design research team and of the PG’s Spatial Justice cluster, the convention transformed the questions I bring to my work. What I carry forward from this experience is a deeper appreciation for belonging as a foundation for equitable design. I find myself asking how urban planning can create stronger relationships between institutions and the people they serve. Kinship draws attention to the responsibilities and forms of care that shape how people experience a place and understand themselves within it. As I continue my work as a student and researcher, these questions will remain with me, informing my approach to the responsibilities that come with shaping conversations about our shared futures. If education helped create the conditions that produced the harms of colonialism, then gatherings such as this one offer a glimpse of how education might contribute to repair by creating the conditions through which prosperous relationships can grow. Most importantly, the convention taught me more about the lived practice of reconciliation, one that extends beyond conversation and into the ways we listen and learn from one another, build relationships, and imagine sustainable shared futures.