Setting Roots Again: 2023 Chihuahuan Desert Cultural Fellowship Feature – Kasi Munoz
Michelle E. Carreon, Food Justice Storyteller
Throughout her life, Kasi Munoz has always created a path for herself that was rooted in a deep connection with nature and an unwavering commitment to community. As a member of the Spring 2023 cohort of the Chihuahuan Desert Cultural Fellowship, Kasi shared her extensive experience in landscape architecture and garden design, as well her approach to community-based education. She also formed a growing relationship with La Semilla’s Community Education and Edible Education Programs. In this fellow profile, we learn about Kasi’s background growing up in the Paso del Norte region and about the ongoing evolution of her cultural and land-based practice.
Upbringings
Growing up in El Paso, TX, Kasi Munoz always talked to plants. She would give them playful and creative names, like Lucy and Ethel from the TV series I Love Lucy. Today, she speaks fondly of growing up on the border and of the strong ties she has with the natural landscape, as well as her family: “Growing up here is all you know. You don’t realize until you leave, the culture, the way it’s rooted in strong family values. That’s the thing that has stood out to me the most, as I’ve lived in other places. Growing up here, there has always been a strong identity to it. ‘I’m from El Paso.’ You say it proudly, and you talk about it. I didn’t know how I felt about it until I left.”
Kasi had a great friend network growing up. She attributes this to the region and its intangible “underlying vibe” that permeates throughout the community–a vibe that is grounded in deep cultural roots and relationships. For many who have left the region to pursue education, job opportunities, or other endeavors, there is a sense of strengthened love for the borderlands and the Chihuahuan Desert, as well as seeing the region as unique–like many border communities. At the same time, there are complexities that come with living in a border space. Growing up Mexican American, Kasi recalls, “I felt caught in this space–I’m not Mexican enough, I’m not white enough.” Her parents grew up in Segundo Barrio and Sunset Heights–historic neighborhoods in El Paso–and raised their family on the Westside of the city, which has the reputation for being more affluent despite being more economically diverse in reality. Kasi recalls, “Everyone is obsessed with where you went to high school in El Paso, and when you tell someone the Westside or Franklin, you get immediately pinned, like ‘Oh you’re rich, oh, you’re white.’ Your identity gets blended with that. I had a bit of an identity crisis. I’ve had something like that most of my life–figuring out where I belonged.” Like many inhabiting the US borderlands, Kasi felt like she was living two lives growing up–on the weekends going to family barbecues and gatherings, and going to school was a whole other identity.
Graduating from high school in 2000, she pursued an environmental science path in her undergraduate studies at Southwest Texas State University (now Texas State University) in San Marcos, Texas. She obtained a BA in Communications and a BS in Geography and Environmental Science with a minor in Nature Heritage and Tourism.
An Evolving Practice
After graduating from college, Kasi spent some years traveling and, later, doing natural building. In time, she completed a permaculture certification in Austin and became interested in landscape design. She started out doing home-scale design and landscaping jobs and eventually moved to Durango, Colorado where she spent two years working in farming and managing market gardens. Eventually, she decided to pursue a graduate degree in landscape architecture at the New School of Architecture in San Diego. During this time, Kasi had an internship at an architectural firm where she would “grind away” and struggled to find fulfillment. But in these struggles, she learned to have no fear in pursuing a path that would bring her back to community spaces. Reflecting today, Kasi says, “I started creating a practice without realizing it.”
Over the years, Kasi formed a deeper understanding of nature, plants, and design with nature in mind. She had forged a path that increased her connection with the natural world–a connection seeded while growing up in the Chihuahuan Desert. She knew firsthand how people can be disconnected from the land and how food is grown. And so, she began working with and learning from community-based nonprofits working in agriculture conservation and planning, as well as providing consultation, especially in constructing children’s environments. Throughout the years, her practice has continued to evolve.
“My practice is really rooted in a community-driven process. My profession that guides it is landscape architecture. The way that I approach that work is with community voices at the front. I use my skill set and work with residents or nonprofits that are working with community members on the ground. I’ve incorporated a specific process in the way that I navigate my projects. It’s about how to invite deeper collaboration, how to navigate a process with community members when you’re navigating bureaucratic processes or processes that are a top-down approach while remaining ground-up.”
For years, Kasi has worked within rural and urban spaces on large scales. She speaks on the complexities and challenges that come with both while maintaining a commitment to what a community envisions. There is an urban ecology that we must reconcile with–from infrastructure that already exists to the impact humans have had on natural landscapes through urbanization. Yet, Kasi sees promise and creativity in these spaces: “I think you can make the most impact in an urban environment, because that’s where the most people are. That’s where the most diverse groups of people are–culturally, economically. Most people live in urban areas.” There is a hybridized environment to contend with, and Kasi believes it’s just like any other process–rooted in observing, learning, documenting, and understanding while accounting for all aspects of a space, from plants (native and non-native) to people’s cultural contributions and histories.
EES (Educational Enrichment Systems): Child Development Center in San Diego, CA
“I am infatuated with the concept of breaking up the concrete and making pathways for native ecologies to come in and thrive and how they are going to adapt to a much hotter and drier environment. There is no one way about it. And I think it gets back to observing a space, whether at a city-wide scale or a neighborhood scale. It’s understanding what you’re working with, like how you are capturing water on site and feeding the soil and your watershed. That’s a big part of land stewardship–feeding your watershed.”
Kasi often comes back to the neighborhood scale of community-building and working with the land. She speaks of these spaces as connecting people and families more and working together to take care of spaces that they are most connected and committed to and sees promise in aggregating interests, skills, and experiences of many for the common good and future generations.
Throughout the years, there has been both an academic learning and a culturally-rooted learning in the evolution of Kasi’s practice. She’s always striving for a blend of the two and incorporating educational dimensions to her projects, while continuing to learn through her own experiences and a desire to gain understanding.
Returning and Rooting Relationships
After many years living and working outside of the Paso del Norte region, Kasi moved back to El Pason in 2021. She has shared that this is the first time she feels like she is making a home again: “Rooting at 41 is a calming feeling. I’m in love with the city.” She has been spending much needed time with her family and learning about local history from her dad. Through their conversations and walking the streets of El Paso again, Kasi has learned more about the history of development throughout the city and the social movements that have resisted displacement and the demolition of culture and history. She also speaks about the challenges she has faced coming back home and acknowledges the time it takes to re-root. She spent a year networking and learning about the local food system, as well as the art placemaking scene and other cultural projects. With a commitment to building trust through humility and being fully present, Kasi continues to navigate these spaces as an individual consultant and is finding her path and market for community-centered work in her community.
Working more closely with La Semilla has been one way Kasi has built local partnerships. In August of 2023, Kasi was a guest presenter at La Semilla’s Cultiva Institute, which is hosted by the Community Education Program for participants representing communities from across the region, including local organizations and farms, city government, public schools, and independent growers and learners. Kasi connected with participants and shared her knowledge and experiences working with different communities to design and build community gardens.
August 2023 Community Education Cultiva Institute session led by Kasi Munoz
(Photo by Michelle Carreon, La Semilla Staff)
Currently, Kasi is collaborating with La Semilla’s Edible Education team on a participatory design process at Lynn Community Middle School in Las Cruces, NM, where they are re-designing an inner courtyard of the school. In December, 2023, Kasi led a student workshop that informed a preliminary design. In February, 2024, she returned to share the design at an open house and gather additional community input. The courtyard will hold Edible Education’s first rain water harvesting infrastructure and be a dynamic outdoor learning space for students to learn, relax, and to connect with nature and their peers. Community build days to install the first phase of infrastructure will occur in Summer 2024.
Lynn Middle School collaboration between Kasi and La Semilla’s Edible Education Program
(Photos provided by Edible Education staff)
Kasi’s presentations cover topics like climate trends, soil health, existing infrastructure and vegetation, native lands, budgeting, accessibility considerations, and shared values. She also shares her insights on the importance of co-creation, dialogue, and long-term commitment. She encourages participants to use their senses at every stage of the garden design process, including sitting and observing, “walking the site,” and taking notes and photos on a regular basis.
What’s Next
Kasi continues to work on a variety of projects with communities inside and outside of the region. She recently wrapped up a project designing children’s environments with Empathy in Nature in San Diego as the lead consultant and designer. She is currently working on a project in Baja California that focuses on a community built in and around a farm where 50% of the open space and native edible plants are preserved. Kasi is also working with another preschool provider in San Diego to design two schoolyards, which will wrap up this month, and is working with a non-profit called Resource Conservation District (RCD) in San Diego to help them develop and fulfill their Community Garden Committee program. Kasi is leading a team training for facilitating community-led projects and working with the RCD team to operationalize the program.
In October, Kasi accepted a position with the City of El Paso to help manage the comprehensive plan project called Envision El Paso. She is excited about the project’s goal to have a robust community input and engagement program, which includes an Ambassador program where residents applied for a paid position to help facilitate outreach and engagement.
“I believe there is a great opportunity to build a long-term program to support community engagement and conversations between City and residents. It is an opportunity to build trust and to create a more equitable engagement process. Another aspect of this project is developing an equity framework that will help city leaders to prioritize plans, projects, and policies based on need. However, this framework cannot be developed without engagement and guidance from residents.”
Through all of her community projects and growing connections, Kasi remains committed to building on a practice that is values-aligned and respectful of the communities she partners with. She acknowledges that building trust and deep relationships takes time and necessitates transparency at all stages of a project. At La Semilla, we are excited to see how Kasi’s practice and efforts grow as she continues to strengthen her roots in her hometown and the surrounding region.
You can learn more about Kasi and her work at:
www.studionectary.com and @studionectary on Instagram
All photos provided by Kasi Munoz unless otherwise noted.
