Future Makers: 50 amazing people changing our world

A rare mix of lo-fi visuals and sky-high ideals, Garrett Bradley’s award-winning doc Time is a story of family, hope and love that takes a hammer to America’s prison-industrial complex. It’s a breakthrough that the New Yorker has been building up to, with MoMA art exhibitions and Sundance-acclaimed short films already announcing her as a formidable storyteller who turns her skills to calling out systemic racism and America’s social problems. If audience and critics’ reactions to it are anything to go by, Time will prove to be timeless.

Biggest achievement so far: An Oscar nomination for Time has put her firmly on Hollywood’s radar. Ava DuVernay has been championing her for ages – everyone else is finally catching up.

How she’s changing the world: Through the power of her art and filmmaking, Bradley is challenging a status quo that leaves African Americans incarcerated at more than five times the rate of white Americans. Phil de Semlyen

@garrettgarrettbradleybradley | garrettabradley.com

A Avó Veio Trabalhar – or ‘Grandma Came to Work’ – is a creative hub that gives more than 70 grandmothers a platform to sell artisanal products and run craft workshops in Lisbon. Founded by Susana António and Angelo Campota, the organisation was built on the ethos that ‘old is beautiful’, and aims to ward off feelings of isolation and abandonment among its members.

Biggest achievement so far: A Avó Veio Trabalhar’s recent fundraising campaign will allow them to stay in their headquarters for another 12 months.

How they’re changing the world: Saving dozens of old ladies from isolation and loneliness in an increasingly ageing city. Vera Moura 

@aavoveiotrabalhar | fermenta.org

If Divine and RuPaul represent the past and present of drag as an art form, its future could look a lot like Bimini Bon Boulash: the British queen who came close to snatching the crown on the latest season of ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race UK’. Vegan, non-binary, working-class, outspoken and supremely articulate, Bimini might not have claimed the title – but they brought topics like gender non-conformity, mental health and the economics of being a performer during a pandemic to Thursday-night TV, while serving iconic looks every week.

Biggest achievement so far: Discussing non-binary status on national TV in a way that even your grandma could understand. And winning the Snatch Game.

How they’re changing the world: By blazing a trail for gender-non-conforming kids worldwide. James Manning

@biminibabes

Lindsay Rose Medoff is single-handedly taking on the fast-fashion industry. Her L.A.-based sew shop collects thousands of pounds of textile waste to recycle each week, offering a national repair programme where anyone can send in clothes to be repaired by a professional garment worker (as well as selling products like linen quilts made entirely from post-consumer waste). In the midst of the pandemic, Medoff started a food distribution programme that feeds more than 200 garment workers and their families each week, and partnered with national Indigenous organisation Seeding Sovereignty to get much-needed PPE in the hands of Indigenous communities.

Biggest achievement so far: Diverting over 250,000 pounds of garments from landfills in a single year.

How she’s changing the world: Giving reclaimed textiles a new life in an attempt to eradicate the massive amount of waste produced by the fast-fashion industry. Sarah Medina

@suaysewshop | suayla.com

There was the much-mimicked ‘Pianos on the Streets’ project. There were the Poetry Jukeboxes. There was once even an opera for spectators in rooftop bathtubs. Ondřej Kobza is always thinking – and dreaming. On top of running food and music hubs Café V Lese and Café Neustadt, plus rooftop events space Střecha Lucerny, this Prague-based entrepreneur has made it his goal to transform urban space with cultural installations and one-off events that linger in the memory for years. Perhaps his most ambitious undertaking yet was a feast that took place on the city’s Charles Bridge last year – a blockbuster event to celebrate the city’s all-too-fleeting reopening.

Biggest achievement so far: Footage from that feast was broadcast around the world. Though it proved a little premature, it gave millions of us hope normality was just around the corner.

How he’s changing the world: Staging fun, free, original events that are imitated across the globe. Huw Oliver

ondrejkobza.cz

Camille Aumont Carnel wears many hats: she’s a former chef turned influencer, author and feminist activist. The 24-year-old has accomplished more in the past decade than many will in a lifetime – and her work’s not over yet. Though she’s perhaps best known as the creator of ‘Je m’en bats le clito’, Carnel is also the face behind @jedisnonchef (I Say No Chef!), an Instagram account that brings the #MeToo movement to Paris’s restaurant scene through anonymous testimonies of harassment, abuse and violence against women in French kitchens. Every heartbreaking story pushes the narrative that the ‘Yes, chef!’ mentality is on its way out.

Biggest achievement so far: Carnel’s attentive audience speaks for itself – between her four accounts, she’s amassed more than 850,000 followers.

How she’s changing the world: With each new story, Carnel is holding restaurants and chefs accountable for bad behaviour and creating safer, more equitable workspaces for women. Morgan Olsen

@camilleaumontcarnel | @jedisnonchef

Changing the world in a ‘fun and positive’ way is the self-proclaimed mission of Andreas Noe. In 2020, this German environmental activist gave up his career as a molecular biology consultant to hike along the entire coast of Portugal, cleaning up beaches and warning of the impact of plastic and waste on ecosystems. His two-month ‘Plastic Hike’ covered more than 500 miles, stopping for talks and meetings with other environmental activists, companies and organisations.

Biggest achievement so far: Collecting 1.6 tons of plastic on his journey, and meeting more than 100 groups – from activists to charities to surf schools – to spread awareness and ukulele-fuelled positivity.

How he’s changing the world: Keeping plastic pollution on the agenda with fun videos and bags of imagination: look out for a film and travelling exhibition in 2021. Vera Moura

@thetrashtraveler | thetrashtraveler.wordpress.com

Wherever Camille Walala goes, faces brighten, smiles spring into being. This London-based street artist may well have brought her bright, playful installations to cities all over the world, from New York to Melbourne. But it’s her hometown where she’s left the greatest mark. Most of her works are temporary, but they crop up with such frequency that her work feels omnipresent. And that’s fine by us: whether they’re murals, pedestrian crossings or full-on labyrinths, her artworks are always brilliantly big and brilliantly joyful.

Biggest achievement so far: The Walala Parade project that transformed an entire East London street last year.

How she’s changing the world: Making public art that never fails to cheer the soul. Huw Oliver

@camillewalala | camillewalala.com

In the early days of the pandemic, Los Angeles bar vets Othón Nolasco and Damian Diaz realised that undocumented restaurant workers were in a particularly vulnerable position. Out of work yet unable to collect unemployment benefits, the veritable backbone of the industry now struggled to put food on the table. The duo quickly rallied their resources and founded No Us Without You LA, a nonprofit that aimed to feed 30 families a week. Now, just a year later, they’re dishing out groceries to more than 1,600 families. Talk about a support system.

Biggest achievement so far: In addition to partnering with United Way of Los Angeles to provide $50,000 (£36,000) in rent relief to those in need, No Us Without You is now branching out to provide tutoring and job-placement programmes to help families get back on their feet.

How they’re changing the world: Nolasco, Diaz and their team of tireless volunteers are honouring the unsung heroes of the restaurant industry while helping families preserve dignity and pride. Morgan Olsen

@nouswithoutyou | nouswithoutyou.la

On the first weekend of Lockdown 1.0, DJs and housemates Harry Gay, Passer and Wacha streamed a party from their London kitchen to give LGBTQ+ people a sense of community in isolation. More than 1,000 tuned in and Queer House Party was born. Since then, thousands from all over the world have joined its virtual shindigs – a mix of drag, performance and genre-bending DJ sets – with inclusivity, accessibility for all and fundraising stitched into its mission. It’s DIY, radical, audacious and, as soon as clubs open again, it’ll be changing how we party for good.

Biggest achievement so far: QHP’s Black Lives Matter fundraiser ripped our kitchen roof off with an hour of Black-led performance, from poetry to drag, and a guest DJ set from Jay Jay Revlon.

How they’re changing the world: This collective is helping to overhaul queer London nightlife to make it more accessible and inclusive for all. Alexandra Sims

@queerpartyhouse | queerhouseparty.co.uk

Born in northern Nigeria, Kunlé Adeyemi followed his father into architecture and cut his teeth working on mega-projects with Dutch visionary Rem Koolhaas. Since 2010, his own Amsterdam-based practice NLÉ has specialised in solving the problems of twenty-first-century cities – most notably, rising sea levels. His ingenious floating structures have included a school in Lagos and (still in progress) a concert hall in Cape Verde. Given that 80 percent of the world’s major cities are by water, it’s an idea whose time may come soon.

Biggest achievement so far: The African Water Cities project, a massive bank of research into how Africa’s cities can evolve in an age of urbanisation and climate change.

How he’s changing the world: By preparing some of the world’s most vulnerable communities – and everyone else – for the devastating impact of rising tides. James Manning

nleworks.com

Like many mayors around the world, Anne Hidalgo has placed green policies at the forefront of her campaigns ever since she was first elected in 2014. Unlike many, she is also acting on them. Parisians can now pedal along 900 miles of new bike lanes. Major roads, including the quais that run alongside the River Seine, have been pedestrianised. Plans are also afoot to plant four new ‘urban forests’ next to major landmarks including the Hôtel de Ville and the Opéra Garnier. Diesel cars are to be banned from 2024, and petrol cars from 2030. Some 170,000 trees are also set to be planted in the city over the next decade. Forget the popular image of Paris as grey, dusty and polluted – against all odds, it is fast becoming one of the world’s greenest cities.

Biggest achievement yet: By 2030, Paris’s most famous street, the Champs-Élysées, will be turned into an ‘extraordinary garden’ as part of a massive €250 million makeover. 

How she’s changing the world: Taking novel and ambitious ideas – like the ’15-minute city’, in which all residents would have access to all basic services within a quarter-hour of home – and building them into central city planning. Huw Oliver

Former geography teacher Daniel Raven-Ellison could be considered a classic British eccentric: who else would start a campaign to turn London, a sprawling city of nine million people, into a designated national park? But behind that eye-catching stunt was a deep and sincere effort to get city-dwellers to engage with the nature all around them – and in 2019 it succeeded, with the UK capital officially being declared the world’s first National Park City.

Biggest achievement so far: Did you get the bit about him turning London into an actual national park? If that’s not enough, he’s currently creating a network of ‘Slow Ways’: thousands of walking routes connecting all of the UK’s towns and cities.

How he’s changing the world: By rewilding city life. It’s not only good for the planet, but a balm for our jaded urban souls. James Manning

@DanRavenEllison | ravenellison.com

Yip Pin Xiu already has a long list of accolades. Multiple gold medals? Check. A seat in parliament? Check. Becoming a disability icon in Singapore? Check. But she’s not done yet. The 28-year-old swimming champion is on a crusade to make disabled people more visible in sport – and the world. She became Singapore’s first Paralympic gold medalist in history at Beijing 2008 and was the first Para athlete to be inducted into Singapore’s Sports Hall of Fame. At the age of 26, she also became one of the youngest-ever members of parliament. Up next? Yip will be in Tokyo this year, ready to extend her role as Singapore’s most decorated Paralympian and celebrated activist.

Biggest achievement so far: She now holds world records in both the 50- and 100-metre backstroke.

How she’s changing the world: Advocating for disability rights and visibility in sport. Sarah Medina

@yippinxiu

If avid travellers Marine Mandrila and Louis Martin have learned one thing after visiting 18 countries together, it’s that cooking brings people and cultures together. That truth is the guiding force behind Refugee Food, their multi-dimensional organisation that connects refugee cooks with some of the world’s best restaurants. Aside from the fact that us bystanders get to try cuisines from around the globe, the programme aims to flip negative perceptions of refugees and offer professional training to up-and-coming chefs.

Biggest achievement so far: Mandrila and Martin bring their mission to life year round at La Résidence, a bricks-and-mortar restaurant in Paris that acts as a launch pad for emerging talent.

How they’re changing the world: The organisation creates a revolving door of positivity: participating chefs gain in confidence, while diners say they come away with a more positive perception of refugee communities. Morgan Olsen

@refugeefoodfestival | refugee-food.org

As executive artistic director of Bated Breath Theatre Company, Lieberman has been creating noteworthy immersive theatrical experiences for years now – like the participatory art auction show ‘Beneath the Gavel’. Her creativity really met the moment this year, however, with ‘Voyeur: The Windows of Toulouse-Lautrec’. An enchanting show that took audience members on a theatrical walking tour through the streets of New York’s West Village, it was completely ahead of the curve – presaging the many outdoor and ‘window’ theatrical events we’re seeing now. Only time will tell what she’ll transform into her stage next.

Biggest achievement so far: Staging a spectacular, pandemic-friendly live production while the city’s theatre stages remained dark.

How she’s changing the world: Lieberman is reimagining what – and where – a theatre can be in our age of social distancing. Will Gleason

unmakinglautrecplay.com | batedbreaththeatre.org

Drawing upon her experience as the cofounder of Three Babes Bakeshop in San Francisco, Lenore Estrada established SF New Deal in the midst of the pandemic with the aim of providing support to small businesses across the city. What started out small soon grew into an organisation that has provided more than one million meals to those in need, as well as supporting countless restaurants with millions of dollars in financial aid.

Biggest achievement so far: Distributing well over $10 million (£7 million) to small businesses.

How she’s changing the world: Helping restaurants to weather the financial storm caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Alex Plim 

sfnewdeal.org

We’re familiar with recycled plastic bags and coffee cups, but how about entire roads? Concerned by campaigns to completely ban plastic, which can be an extremely important resource for poor communities, chemistry professor Dr Rajagopalan Vasudevan set out to find a way to dispose of it on a mass scale without harming the planet. Back in 2001, he discovered that molten plastic is really good at binding the materials that make up roads and also makes them far more durable and less prone to problems like potholes. Using the remains of everything from plastic water bottles to single-use bags, Dr Rajagopalan has already helped lay tens of thousands of kilometres of plastic-paved roads in India, all while saving tonnes of plastic from ending up stagnating in landfill.

Biggest achievement so far: Winning the Padma Shri – a renowned civilian award in India – for his research into reusing plastic waste.

How they’re changing the world: Dr Vasudevan is reimagining the way we think about plastics and what can do with them. Alexandra Sims

Bryant Terry, it’s fair to say, is a chef of the people. This much-lauded cook, educator and author fights to create a more healthy, just and sustainable food system. Take, for example, his six-year stint as chef-in-residence at San Francisco’s Museum of the African Diaspora (MoAD), where he creates public programming on topics such as ‘Black queer food’ and ‘farming while Black’. Or the fact he serves on the board for Mothers-for-Mothers, an undergraduate project-turned-cookbook that focuses on the postpartum food wisdom of immigrant Asian American and Pacific Islander women. Or his latest book, ‘Black Food’: a heartfelt tribute to Black culinary ingenuity, out this October.

Biggest achievement so far: His cookbook, ‘Vegetable Kingdom’, won a NAACP Image Award in the Outstanding Literary work category.

How he’s changing the world: By fighting for good food to be an everyday right, not a privilege. Sarah Medina

@bryantterry | bryant-terry.com

As former associate creative director of wild – and wildly popular – Hobart arts festival Dark Mofo, Hannah Fox knows a thing or two about art’s weird side. The festival is famous for its twin obsessions of sex and death, and its artists, collaborators and directors push boundaries almost to breaking point. Now Fox is co-artistic director of Melbourne’s brand-new winter arts festival Rising, she’s ready to smash straight through boundaries entirely.

Biggest achievement so far: Rising is the most ambitious artistic programme Melbourne has ever seen, taking over the city for two weeks with more than 130 projects.

How she’s changing the world: Fox believes in ‘culture as a human right’ – if it shows us the path to the future, she’s the one leading the way. Cass Knowlton

@hannah_h_fox

If you ever wondered how trees speak to each other underground or why purple and yellow flowers grow near each other, Indigenous botanist Robin Wall Kimmerer is here to blow your mind. In her bestselling book, ‘Braiding Sweetgrass’, Wall Kimmerer expertly combines scientific precision with Native American wisdom to beautifully and poignantly portray the secret workings of the North American wilderness and also how much plants, animals and landscapes have been inalterably changed since colonisation. Kimmerer’s prose is poetic in the way she acknowledges how much modern western civilisation is removed from nature and also in her encouragement for us all to return to a reciprocal relationship with the land and all its creatures.

Biggest achievement so far: Her first book, ‘Gathering Sweetgrass’, is a New York Times bestseller and an Internet phenomenon.

How she’s changing the world: Advocating for a return to a reciprocal relationship between humans and nature. Sarah Medina

robinwallkimmerer.com

With the propulsive Les Misérables, filmmaker Ladj Ly lobbed a metaphorical Molotov cocktail into French cinemas. It posed tough questions about the state of France’s tinderbox banlieues, demanding change in the spirit of all great social realism, while remaining as gripping as a thriller. He’s helping bring about change of his own, too: through the École Kourtrajmé, a free film school in Les Mis’s Parisian suburb of Montfermeil, he aims to nurture new talent from underprivileged, underrepresented backgrounds. Spike Lee, George Lucas and street artist JR have all lent their expertise as teachers.

Biggest achievement so far: A César award, Cannes acclaim and an Oscar nomination for Les Misérables. Just as importantly, it reached as far as Emmanuel Macron, who was reported to have been troubled by its depiction of France’s urban estates.

How he’s changing the world: Ly’s moviemaking chops and his film finishing school are pushing stories from the margins firmly into the mainstream. Look out for a new Netflix partnership too. Houssine Bouchama

@ladyly | @ecolekourtrajme

Bjarke Ingels started turning heads a decade or so ago with punchy catchphrases like ‘hedonistic sustainability’ and ‘yes is more’. But far from being devoid of substance, those buzzwords do pretty much sum up the WTFery of this Danish architect’s work. From the CopenHill power plant in Copenhagen that doubles up at a ski slope to the Via 57 West ‘courtscraper’ in Manhattan and his plans to build a whole new sustainable city off Penang Island in Malaysia, his projects are unfailingly futuristic and optimistic – and very often iconoclastic too.

Biggest achievement yet: With backing from the United Nations, Ingels has revealed a plan to create floating habitats for up to 10,000 people. His firm, BIG, has already built prototypes in Copenhagen and intends eventually to deploy the ‘Oceanix’ concept in South-East Asia. Is this the future of urban climate resilience?

How he’s changing the world: Totally rethinking the way the humans interact with the planet and promoting a much more sustainable kind of urban development. Huw Oliver

@bjarkeingels | big.dk

While living in Berlin during the height of the pandemic, Jo channelled her passion for inspiring and helping others through her painting by creating SendtoGive, an online platform that allows people to send postcards of hope bearing her images. She then takes the profits and uses them to support For Our Farmers PH, a youth-led nonprofit assisting farmers and fishermen in the Philippines, and Simama Na Dada, an initiative providing more than 6,000 disadvantaged young girls in Nairobi with basic feminine products and education around HIV/AIDS and healthy living.

Biggest achievement so far: Her work at SendToGive landed her a spot at TEDxBerlin, where she delivered a speech on ‘How to Paint a Future of Hope’.

How she’s changing the world: Through SendToGive, Bautista helps to foster meaningful human connections and channel good intentions into real-world actions, one postcard at a time. Tatum Ancheta

@jo_bautista | sendtogive.org

You’ve probably heard of Greta Thunberg, but you also need to know about Hilda Flavia Nakabuye. A campaigner on climate change since her late teens, she helped bring the global school strikes for climate to her home country of Uganda in 2019 – with astonishing success. She’s also been outspoken about widening the climate struggle beyond wealthier countries, particularly given that changing climates threaten the global south first and worst. As she’s said: ‘I am a victim of this climate crisis and I am not ashamed to say so.’

Biggest achievement so far: Helping to sign up more than 50,000 people to campaign for Fridays for Future in Uganda and across East Africa.

How she’s changing the world: By bearing vivid witness to the climate crisis, and keeping up the pressure on political leaders to take serious, meaningful action – right now. James Manning

@Fridays4FutureU | fridaysforfuture.org

Nick Kokonas spends a lot of time contemplating what restaurants need to be successful. It makes sense when you consider his day job(s) as co-owner of Chicago-based Alinea Group (maybe you’ve heard of their three-Michelin star namesake?) and founder of revolutionary reservations platform Tock. When both business models were rendered temporarily obsolete in March 2020, Kokonas flipped the script. Alinea turned to takeaway, while Tock To Go emerged as the delivery platform of our dreams. Unlike Grubhub and Doordash, which have been criticised for overwhelming restaurants with fees, Kokonas’s brainchild skims off just three percent. And now, as restaurants reopen their doors, they’ll be able to use Tock’s pre-paid reservation system, which cuts down on no-show guests and food waste. Win-win-win.

Biggest achievement so far: Kokonas recently sold Tock to Squarespace for a cool $400 million (£287 million); he remains CEO. Way to bury the lede, huh?

How he’s changing the world: Simply put, Kokonas is the Robin Hood of the restaurant industry – he’s restoring restaurant owners’ power one reservation at a time. Morgan Olsen

 @nkokonas | tock.com

Since launching in 2013, husband-and-wife team Anthony and Teanne Andrews have been on a tireless quest to bring Black British film to new audiences. With screenings, Q&As and even the odd cosplay event, they’ve built a community, started a thousand conversations, run a season at the British Film Institute and reflected stories of Black British life back to audiences across the country. Discovery, connection and empowerment through film and filmmaking are the name of the game. Watch them go.

Biggest achievement so far: Parable’s Spike Lee retrospective in 2017 saw the man himself stop by for a special Q&A, delivering an endorsement that’s helped jet-propel We Are Parable’s mission. ‘That was a tipping point for us,’ says Teanne.

How they're changing the world: We Are Parable’s latest initiative, Momentum, will offer mentoring and encouragement to up-and-coming Black filmmakers – even psychological support to help with mental toll involved in pushing through barriers. Phil de Semlyen

@weareparable | weareparable.com

For Loujain al-Hathloul, it all started with a drive home from the airport. The women’s rights activist got behind the wheel to protest Saudi Arabia’s then-ban on women driving and quickly emerged as a leading campaigner in the fight against the country’s male guardianship rules. al-Hathloul was arrested and jailed for her protests in May 2018, and despite the fact that Saudi Arabia changed the law a few weeks later, she was sentenced to five years and eight months in prison for violating the country’s counter-terrorism laws. Recently released, al-Hathloul continues her fight while under probation, though you likely won’t see her on social media anytime soon – her tweets have been declared ‘illegal’ by the Saudi government.

Biggest achievement so far: Just this week she was awarded The Vaclav Havel Human Rights Award.

How she’s changing the world: Putting her own body on the line, including multiple hunger strikes, for women’s independence. Sarah Medina

loujainalhathloul.org

Tania Safura Adam was born in Maputo, Mozambique, but at the age of six she moved with her family to Europe: first to Lisbon, then to Madrid, before ultimately settling in Barcelona in 2004. This journey led her to set up Radio Africa, a publication that celebrates and explores African music, art and culture, with a specific focus on stories around the Spanish-speaking diaspora.

Biggest achievement so far: Bringing audiences closer to the enormous richness and diversity of African culture. Her fight against racism and ignorance is hugely inspiring whatever your background or skin colour.

How she’s changing the world: Opening eyes and ears to art and music of the African continent. MJ Gómez 

radioafricamagazine.com

This London-based collective turns the forensic gaze on governments and corporations, using cutting-edge architectural techniques to investigate state violence and human rights abuses around the world. Led by architect Eyal Weizman and based at Goldsmiths, University of London, the group includes architects, artists, filmmakers, software developers, investigative journalists, lawyers, archaeologists and scientists. They combine on-site research with digital modelling and analysis of witness footage and testimony to deliver compelling recreations of crime scenes that have been used as evidence in courts across the globe. In 2018, they were also nominated for the Turner Prize for art, in recognition of their super-elaborate and super-innovative architectural models.

Biggest achievement yet: It’s hard to pick out a single case, but back in 2015, their investigation into explosions in the city of Rafah, Gaza, managed to locate and map hundreds of Israeli strikes (by analysing the shape and movement of the bomb clouds). It exposed Israel’s controversial military initiative known as the Hannibal Directive – and led to it being scrapped.

How they’re changing the world: Using art and architecture to draw attention to state crime and miscarriages of justice – with gripping, stylishly packaged bodies of evidence that are ready to be presented in court. Huw Oliver

@forensicarchitecture | forensic-architecture.org 

Way back in 2012, David Yeung founded the Green Monday campaign to lead Hongkongers toward a more sustainable lifestyle, advocating meatless Mondays to help mitigate the city’s carbon footprint. In 2015, he followed up with Green Common, a plant-based grocery store that currently has nine Hong Kong locations as well as online platforms. And in 2018, Green Monday launched OmniPork, a plant-based protein that has became a popular meat substitute in Hong Kong’s restaurant kitchens. It’s now available in ten countries. 

Biggest achievement so far: Green Monday has been a huge hit: today, nearly half of Hong Kong’s population is aware of the campaign, and increasing numbers are reducing meat or going flexitarian.

How he’s changing the world: By creating a significant shift in HK’s food culture and consumer behaviour, David is shifting one of Asia’s most trendsetting cities towards green, healthy and sustainable living. James Manning

@greenmondaydavid | greenmonday.org

A familiar face at LGBTQ+ parties across Paris, DJ Leslie Barbara Butch is also an outspoken advocate for inclusive parties that are accessible to all bodies: queer people, fat people, disabled people, migrants. To take a stand against grossophobia, she regularly poses in her underwear, scrawling insults that she’s received on her body. After making the front page of Télérama magazine, her photos were censored on Instagram and Facebook, which allowed her to highlight an inherently biased algorithm that calculates the proportion of visible skin on photos and so can discriminate against fat people.

Biggest achievement so far: Becoming the 2021 model and muse for designer Jean Paul Gaultier.

How she’s changing the world: Creating safe, uncomplicated party spaces for all. Houssine Bouchama

@barbarabutch

Not every community has equal access to affordable, healthy produce and meals. One activist who’s working to change that is Ianne Fields Stewart, the founder of The Okra Project. The collective provides free, nutritious meals to Black trans people that they may not have the resources to make themselves, and has since expanded that mission to include other forms of direct support like rental assistance. We can’t wait to see where they go next.

Biggest achievement so far: Stewart delivered a passionate speech to 15,000 people gathered outside the Brooklyn Museum in support of Black trans lives last summer.

How she’s changing the world: Raising awareness of the difficulties that Black trans individuals face and providing concrete help and assistance to that community. Will Gleason 

@thefreeactorvist | iannefieldsstewart.com

There’s a new revolution happening in Paris! With a third of France’s carbon footprint coming from food, in 2019 Camille Delamar, Rodney Paul and Fanny Giansetto decided to launch Écotable: a new certification scheme that labels environmentally responsible restaurants and supports establishments wanting to go greener. Écotable awards green stickers according to the restaurant’s commitment to sustainability: everything from food sourcing to reuse and recycling of packaging.

Biggest achievement so far: Sending their new green stickers creeping across France, and triggering the super-established Michelin Guide’s own creation of a ‘green star’ in 2020.

How they're changing the world: Agitating and acting to make restaurants everywhere more sustainable, at all points of the supply chain. Houssine Bouchama

@_ecotable_ | ecotable.fr

Barcelona’s polluted central streets are getting a much-needed reup. One by one, they are being incorporated into superilles (‘superblocks’): an initiative pursued by mayor Ada Colau that seeks to turn whole neighbourhoods into pedestrian-friendly car-free zones. Trees are planted, bike lanes and public seating areas built. The first superblock was introduced in Poblenou in 2016, and the mayor’s aim is to transform the entire city over the coming decade – a goal equal parts admirable and ambitious. The first woman to be elected Barcelona mayor, Colau’s other major achievement is to find a better balance between citizens and tourists. That’s involved banning the construction of new hotels, seizing empty properties and tightening laws against illegal tourist rentals. However much you like going on holiday to Barcelona, we can all agree that’s a good thing.

Biggest achievement so far: Signing off on a ‘super-superblock’ stretching across 21 streets in the traffic-clogged Eixample area; cars will now be banned. Work begins in 2022.

How she’s changing the world: Undoing the ‘Airbnbification’ that has hollowed out her city’s historic central districts. Barcelona should soon feel like a city from another era. Huw Oliver

@AdaColau

After a series of hate crimes targeting Asian Americans left the United States in mourning earlier this year, three San Francisco Bay Area-based colleagues – Manjusha P. Kulkarni, of the Asian Pacific Planning and Policy Council; Cynthia Choi, of Chinese for Affirmative Action; Russell Jeung, a professor in Asian American studies at SF State University – launched Stop AAPI Hate. This online reporting centre tracks and responds to incidents of hate, violence, harassment and discrimination against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders across the USA.

Biggest achievement so far: Launching stopaapihate.org in 11 different languages.

How they’re changing the world: Bringing visibility to the continued racial discrimination against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the USA. Sarah Medina

stopaapihate.org

To be frank, chef José Andrés is better at managing disaster relief than most governments. His global nonprofit, World Central Kitchen, harnesses the power of food to nourish communities in times of crisis. The organisation travels the globe to dish out warm meals amid natural and manmade disasters – with 2020 serving the challenge of a lifetime. As a restaurateur himself, Andrés understands the importance of working hand in hand with local restaurants to simultaneously reinvigorate the economy and provide food to those who need it. It’s all part of Andrés’s decade-old mission to create a world ‘where there is always a hot meal, an encouraging word and a helping hand in hard times’.

Biggest achievement so far: During the Covid-19 crisis alone, World Central Kitchen has served more than 36 million meals in 400 cities and paid out $150 million (£129 million) to more than 2,500 restaurants.

How he’s changing the world: Andrés and his team not only show up when disaster strikes, but also reinvest in communities, improve food security and create jobs. They're building a better future one plate at a time. Morgan Olsen

@chefjoseandres | joseandres.com

This young, talented Portuguese actress and theatre director is punching through walls to promote female-led arts and female artists. She channelled the proceeds from a prestigious National Theatre award into a unique artistic undertaking called Cassandra, which encompasses theatre projects, a podcast and a feminist book club, Heróides. Oh, and she’s also a tireless influencer and activist working to shape cultural policies.

Biggest achievement so far: When a book makes Heróides’ monthly reading list it usually sells out, such is the growing cultural cachet of Barros Leitão’s feminist book club.

How she’s changing the world: This Porto-raised star-in-the-making is fighting for women and using the arts to influence cultural policy across the country. Vera Moura

sarabarrosleitao.pt | cassandra.pt

Headed by Antoine Plane but operating very much as a collective, Yes We Camp aims to reinvent unoccupied and derelict spaces in France, saving urban wastelands and buildings that are destined to be demolished by temporarily transforming them into so-called ‘third places’. The group works in close partnership with city authorities and property developers to ensure their projects are accessible to audiences of all backgrounds, while promoting local businesses and providing a platform for up-and-coming artists.

Biggest achievement so far: Reinventing Foresta in Marseille, an abandoned plot of land that now boasts restaurants, concerts and agricultural projects – along with a giant, hillside ‘Marseille’ sign to rival that of Hollywood.

How they’re changing the world: Saving unused urban plots and reinventing them as inclusive, artistic, multicultural spaces. Tina Meyer 

@yes_we_camp | yeswecamp.org 

You know that pang of guilt you feel when you throw away excess food from the back of the fridge? Londoners Tessa Clarke and Saasha Celestial-One were so irked by that feeling that they developed OLIO, a neighbour-to-neighbour food-sharing platform that allows people to list and claim surplus produce. (Think of it as the free Facebook Marketplace of good secondhand food.) The app now saves thousands of food items from being wasted every single week.

Biggest achievement so far: In just six years, OLIO has amassed over 3.5 million users from 59 countries who have shared almost 18 million portions of food – and counting.

How they’re changing the world: Clarke and Celestial-One aren’t just feeding communities – they’re tackling global food waste, which in turn prevents CO2 emissions from permeating the atmosphere. Morgan Olsen

@olio.app | olioex.com

There’s thinking big, and then there’s thinking really, ridiculously big. Kieran Long, director of ArkDes (the Swedish Centre for Architecture and Design), has grand plans to redesign every street in the country. His Street Moves initiative, developed in collaboration with ‘national innovation body’ Vinnova, goes to communities and says: what do you want your street to look like? Residents pop along to workshops, they chip in with suggestions – more bike parking, more planters, more play space – and their wishes are granted thanks to an adaptable kit of pinewood street furniture, shaped to fit a parking space. It’s a hint of what a car-free future might look like.

Biggest achievement so far: The project has been rolled out at four trial sites in Stockholm, with three more cities already signed up. Next: the rest of the world?

How he’s changing the world: Making cities more liveable, from the street up. Huw Oliver

arkdes.se

Black people make up 15 percent of the US population, yet Black-owned businesses rarely get their time in the spotlight. Enter Aurora James. The Brooklyn-based small business owner created the ‘15 Percent Pledge’ to call on major retailers to dedicate 15 percent of their shelf space to Black-owned businesses. Retailers like Sephora, Madewell, Gap and Rent the Runway have already taken the pledge. Want to make space for Black fashion brands in your own closet? Check out James’s own accessories brand, Brother Vellies.

Biggest achievement so far: Getting businesses like Yelp and Vogue to take the 15 percent pledge.

How she’s changing the world: By making space for Black-owned businesses in some of the world’s biggest stores. Sarah Medina

@aurorajames | 15percentpledge.org

Jeff Rotmeyer is the founder of ImpactHK, a nonprofit that provides shelter, care and jobs for the city’s homeless population, with 10,000 volunteers providing the community with 500 meals a day. But that’s not all: Jeff also created the Love 21 Foundation, a charity dedicated to improving the lives of Hongkongers living with Down syndrome and autism through dedicated sports and nutrition programmes (and a free food shop stocked with organic veg, grains and snacks).

Biggest achievement so far: Jeff’s Love 21 Foundation has provided support to more than 80 families in Hong Kong, while ImpactHK has helped more than 350 people get off the streets.

How he’s changing the world: Through simple acts of kindness, Jeff is helping to empower homeless people, as well as those living with Down syndrome and autism. Tatum Ancheta

impacthk.org | love21foundation.com

One look at self-proclaimed ‘multitasker’ Lee Tran Lam’s résumé, and it’s clear she’s not the type to half-arse anything. When Lam and a group of fellow journalists started questioning the sameness in food media, they got to work to find tangible solutions. Diversity In Food Media was born, offering bite-size profiles of LGBTQ+ and BIPOC talent on Instagram as well as a massive digital database of creatives for editors to browse. Their mission is simple and admirable: helping people from underrepresented backgrounds break into food media and share their stories with the masses.

Biggest achievement so far: Did we mention that there’s a book, too? Lam edited ‘New Voices on Food’, a collection of essays, stories and artwork from new and emerging voices in media.

How she’s changing the world: By creating a more inclusive environment for food media, Lam and her crew hope to shake up the stagnant Ratatouille-style restaurant critic stereotype and offer fresh perspectives for a global audience. Morgan Olsen

@leetranlam | theunbearablelightnessofbeinghungry.com

Consider Mwazulu Diyabanza a Robin Hood of provenance. The Congolese activist attempts to claw back African art from European museums and return it to his home continent. Here’s the catch: he records the entire attempt on Facebook Live – a fact that has allowed him to avoid major jail time by showing that the acts are more protest than actual theft – and uses the platform and subsequent media coverage to condemn the continued colonising practices of Western museums. Since last summer, Diyabanza has hit the Louvre, the Musée du Quai Branly and the Museum of African, Oceanic and Amerindian Arts in France and the Afrika Museum in Berg en Dal in Netherlands. Fines and probation won’t stop him though; he’s got his eyes set on even more countries this summer.

Biggest achievement so far: Walking into the Louvre, removing a funerary post from its mount and heading for the door.

How he’s changing the world: Forcing museums around the world to reckon with repatriation and the violent history that brought these artefacts to Western institutions. Sarah Medina

@mwazulu

Amsterdam is cleaning up its image. Already the city has banned new shops aimed at tourists from opening in its historic centre – and it has also clamped down on Airbnb in certain districts. Now it is planning to ban foreign visitors from its cannabis-peddling coffeeshops and to move its tourist-swarmed red-light district away from the city centre. None of the moves have been without controversy, but for many Amsterdammers, mayor Femke Halsema has transmuted into a folk hero out above all to protect the interests of locals.

Biggest achievement so far: Drastically rebranding Amsterdam as a tourist destination.

How she’s changing the world: Saying no to certain kinds of flying visitor. In her words: ‘Amsterdam is an international city and we wish to attract tourists… but for its richness, beauty and cultural institutions.’ Huw Oliver

Between playing in multiple bands and releasing a trio of records over the past year, Nnamdi Ogbonnaya is one of Chicago’s busiest musicians. But it’s his work as the co-owner of indie label Sooper Records that’s helping mould the next generation of exciting local artists (folks like Sen Morimoto and KAINA), while demonstrating the power of DIY-scene teamwork.

Biggest achievement so far: A placement of his song ‘Wasted’ in the Netflix drama Malcolm & Marie, which earned him an Instagram shoutout from country star Kacey Musgraves.

How he’s changing the world: NNAMDÏ is creating and releasing music on his own terms – and helping the next generation of Chicago artists do the same. Zach Long

@nnamdithegreat | nnamdiogbonnaya.bandcamp.com

A master’s in social policy – and experience working on political campaigns – no doubt came in useful when, in 2005, Emily May founded Hollaback!, a global movement that aims to stamp out harassment in all its forms. Its education and training initiatives are now present in more than 20 cities around the world, and have spawned offshoots such as HeartMob (which combats online harassment) and The People’s Supper (which helped build relationships between different communities). You can even get free training yourself on how to intervene when your see harassment happening.

Biggest achievement so far: Winning countless awards for her impact and leadership, including the TEDCity 2.0 Prize.

How she’s changing the world: Through education and training that helps people feel empowered to tackle harassment head-on. Alex Plim

ihollaback.org

As the big boss at Turin-based nonprofit Torino Stratosferica, Luca Ballarini lets his fellow citizens imagine a better city. A self-described ‘collective experiment in city imaging’, this pioneering group encourages local creatives to propose flashy designs to transform rundown parts of town. During last year’s first lockdown, one of those ideas also became a reality: stretching 700 metres from the Po River up to a piazza on the neighbouring hillside, Precollinear Park is a tram line-turned-incredibly scenic rambling spot. But it’s so much more than a park: yoga classes, concerts and DJ sets have also made it a cultural destination.

Biggest achievement so far: That ‘linear park’ is one of many similar initiatives set to transform former transport infrastructure around the world. All cities should be looking at this one in particular and thinking: we want one too.

How he’s changing the world: Giving locals a proper say in what their city looks like.

@lucaballarini74 | torinostratosferica.it

As chair of the 10 Deserts Project, Peter Murray leads the largest, Indigenous-led conservation network on Earth, aimed at maintaining and protecting the exceptional diversity of Australia’s Outback. The unique project combines contemporary natural resource management with traditional, Indigenous knowledge to secure the future of endangered species such as bilbies and rock wallabies. It also aims to ensure another 50,000 years of continuous Indigenous occupation of the region.

Biggest achievement so far: Creating an all-female ranger team to look after the Outback.

How he’s changing the world: Protecting one of the last wild places on Earth through Indigenous leadership and conservation. Sarah Medina

@10desertsoz | 10deserts.org