Sunshine Chen, B.E.S., B.Arch
Experience Designer, Storyteller, Artist, Mountain Dweller
Sunshine was trained in architecture and went on to work for the City of Waterloo in Urban Planning, Design and Downtown Redevelopment. After leaving the City, Sunshine founded Urban Imagination & Design Co. and then Storybuilders Creative Communications and Media to tell stories with video, photography and visual storytelling for clients such as The Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo, The City of Swift Current, The Suncor Energy Foundation and Reconciliation Canada.
More recently, Sunshine has been invited to bring his design and storytelling knowledge to various Change Labs, Design Observatories, Human Centred Design Workshops and Design Thinking Spaces to varying fields ranging from: improving children’s well-being in Canada for UNICEF, to making transit more affordable to low income households for Grand River Transit, to raising awareness and promoting the health of the Watershed for the Red Deer River Water Alliance, to designing program/services for Peter Lougheed Centre for Leadership at The Banff Centre.
In July of 2016, Sunshine attended Getting to Maybe: A Social Innovation Residency. Following the program, Sunshine re-located from Waterloo, Ontario to Canmore, Alberta to find a better balance in his life and work with the Natural world and to more fully explore mountain life and adventures outdoors.
Michael Pealow, B.Com,Ec.D(F), PAED
Facilitator, Storyteller, Adventurer, Trickster
Michael was exposed to the north, from Alaska to Nunavut, at an early age and fell in love with the north and its people. Pursuing that love, he relocated to Fort Liard in the Northwest Territories in January 2002, employed as the Economic Development Officer for Fort Liard, Trout Lake, and Nahanni Butte, where he owes a debt of gratitude to the people who taught him so much about the real world.
Relocating to Whitehorse, Yukon in August 2005, he spent a short time as the Acting Senior Business Development Advisor – Renewable Resources for the Government of Yukon before previous clients asked him to contract his services to them. Pealow left Government of Yukon in June 2006 to establish a business and economic development consulting company. Since then, the services he's offered have grown and evolved, serving clients in business and industry, government (self-governing and non-self-governing First Nations, federal, provincial/territorial, and municipal), and not-for-profit organizations in a wide range of fields.
After attending Getting to Maybe: A Social Innovation Residency at the Banff Centre in 2016, Michael shifted the focus of his work to consulting and facilitation for social innovation and is now actively decolonizing everything he can, including the way he works. Michael's favourite place to be is on the land, and he loves to share that passion with anyone adventurous enough to join him.
Michael now lives in Däkwäkada (Haines Junction, Yukon), where he can be closer to the mountains.