Why We Built the Urbanism Retreat (and Why You Should Come)
Most conferences are panels and coffee breaks.
Most retreats are yoga mats and trust falls.
This is neither.
The Urban Spaceship Urbanism Retreat is a new kind of gathering. Part underground summit, part field expedition, part civic reboot. Built for the urban thinkers, policy hackers, place-makers, developers, designers, neighborhood operators, and system-shifters who are done waiting for permission and ready to build what’s next.
We call it a Roundabout, because it’s not linear. It’s iterative. It loops back. And the exits are entirely yours.
What It Is
This is a 3-day immersive retreat that drops you into a living city. Each retreat explores a different place, places that have made moves, broken molds, or cracked something open. Our first: Medellín, Colombia.
You’ll explore the systems. Meet the people. Walk the streets. Get inside the infrastructure. Hear from those who’ve pushed it forward — and those left out.
It’s not about studying a city from the outside.
It’s about using one city to understand your own.
Who It’s For
We built this for:
• Public sector intrapreneurs tired of process without progress
• Developers looking to do it differently
• Neighborhood builders hungry for tools, not just theory
• Planners, architects, policy creatives, and civic technologists
• Anyone designing systems people actually live inside
If you’ve ever walked through a city and thought,
"This could be better. This could be something else."
This retreat is for you.
What You’ll Do
Each retreat includes:
• Urban Fieldwork — guided explorations through key urban interventions, infrastructure, and neighborhoods
• Local Intel — conversations with civic leaders, grassroots organizers, cultural disruptors, and policy innovators
• Workshop Sessions — collaborative problem-solving and frameworks you can apply at home
• Reflection + Integration — space to synthesize, connect, and challenge your assumptions
• Off-the-Record Real Talk — not panels. Not lectures. Just candor with people doing real work
• Side Streets + Shared Meals — because the best ideas often show up in alleyways and over empanadas
Why It Matters
We don’t need more smart cities.
We need braver ones. Fairer ones. Stranger ones.
We need cities that work better because we’ve redesigned who they work for.
Urban change doesn’t happen at the main stage of a conference.
It happens in collisions. In back rooms. In field notes. In discomfort.
It happens when you get out of your zone, and into someone else’s lived reality.
The Roundabout is a place to do that.
To rethink what’s possible, alongside people who’ve stopped asking for permission.
Ready to Enter the Loop?
Spots are limited. The format is intimate.
If you’re interested in shaping the next retreat or want to join us in Medellín, [join the interest list] or reach out directly.
Bring your brain. Bring your block. We’ll bring the rest.
