Description

Milena Ivkovic is an architect, urban planner and civic participation innovator specializing in place-led public space renewal. Milena’s experience includes working for various Dutch and international consultancies and think-tanks on holistic public space design methodologies. She managed the ISOCARP UPAT programme for in-situ participatory workshops on urban regeneration in China, Indonesia and South Africa, and led the dynamic content preparation of Placemaking Week China 2018. She has guided several multi-stakeholder, participatory field researches on the quality of public space in collaboration with YDF, UN HABITAT and UITP, in China, India and Sri Lanka. Milena has been invited to share her knowledge and experience on participatory urbanism at academic lectures conferences in more than 10 countries and has authored and co-authored several publications on the topic.

Milena is the creative director of BLOK 74 based in Rotterdam. BLOK 74 is a digital design collective with expertise in serious games and gamified simulations for collaborative urban design and scientific communication. Over the course of years, BLOK 74 projects and services have grown to include more than 10 different locations and programs across Europe and internationally. The practice developed digital and analogue methodologies on how to include a different range of actors in civic engagement and co-design of public space for the purpose of privately and publicly funded programs.

Since 2021, Milena has been leading the Association Placemaking Western Balkans, a non-profit association of urban professionals based in Belgrade, Serbia. Since its inception, Placemaking Balkans has been awarded several EU cross-border collaboration projects aimed to advance urban renewal processes using placemaking tools and methods.

She is also a Board Member of Placemaking Europe Foundation in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.