Fast Company: Barbara Bouza highlights power of live, work, play communities

The former president of Walt Disney Imagineering and now our company's first executive director of live, work, play, Barbara recognizes that thoughtfully designed mixed-use districts can transform cities, bring people together and drive innovation and economic impact.

In her piece, she traces these truths back to Walt Disney and his vision for the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow (EPCOT) as a living blueprint for tomorrow.

He believed that through an ecosystem of residential, commercial and recreation interconnected through multi-mobility, transportation and walkability, communities could find new ways to connect and flourish.

Barbara then uses the piece to showcase how mixed-use districts are reshaping all different types of communities in modern society. She points to each of the following:

• How higher education campuses are finding new ways to "integrate communities by combining residential, academic, athletics, cultural and entrepreneurial spaces to foster connection and innovation."
  
• The multiple ways experience design is helping reimagine sports, entertainment, retail and community spaces.
  
• How designing "communities of today" can reinforce people -first mindsets for diverse residential lifestyles that infuse vibrant work environments, entrepreneurial education, accessible healthcare, mobility and immersive human experiences.
  

Barbara then concludes her article by suggesting that "how we design communities that genuinely serve the people who inhabit them is still relevant today in the 'real world' of cities, neighborhoods and campuses.