Aspen is a place for leaders to lift their sights above the possessions which possess them. To confront their own nature as human beings, to regain control over their own humanity by becoming more self-aware, more self-correcting, and hence more self-fulfilling.
Are you ready to bring home a model of local partnership that fosters connection and trust among neighbors? We are looking to reach 75 new communities in the next three years. Yours could be one of them.
Ignite a local culture of connection and trust
After testing a local partnership model for four years in different settings – a medium city (Baltimore, MD), rural Appalachia (Wilkes County, NC), and a mixed rural-suburban-urban setting (Benton and Washington counties in northwest Arkansas) – we are ready to reach more communities and support neighbors to weave connection and trust through mutual care.
Weave is inviting 75 organizations to partner with us in their communities over the next three years. The first 25 communities will be selected this year. Applications close Nov 2, 2025.
Each partner, whom we call community hosts, will receive seed funds of $225,000 along with tools, training, access to Weave resources, and peer support.
At the core of these partnerships are the Weaver Awards, a program that celebrates and publicly recognizes 20 folks who are bringing neighbors together to address shared needs. Each of them receive a micro-grant of $2,500 or $5,000, tools, trainings, gatherings, and visibility that helps them grow their work.
A local advisory board, composed of local leaders who are deeply rooted in the community, selects the folks who receive this recognition. Since we launched, 130 folks have been selected as Weaver Awardees.
The Weaver Awards opened up so many doors. It helped me solidify financially, strengthen my community, and people from all over town started to reach out to me. I was featured in an article and it built a web of new connections, grants, and partnerships.
Ulysses Archie, Jr.
2023 Baltimore Weaver Awardee
Recognize your community’s trust builders
Many of the Weaver Awardees say that one of the most important parts of the local partnership is that it gives them an opportunity to share their stories. They understand the value of their work and the impact in their neighborhood, but often feel alone and unseen.
When they meet others like them who celebrate and resonate with their stories of weaving their communities, it changes the way they see themselves.
“Even though I was very nervous at first, Weave gave me the platform to speak and share my story. It gave me the confidence to continue telling it, because it needed to be heard to continue growing my work. It was a really important part of getting funds from two additional organizations,” says Jennifer West, a 2024 Baltimore Weaver Awardee.
Haneef Hardy, a 2022 Baltimore Weaver Awardee, speaks of the impact of Weave’s local partnership.
The Weave team works with the Weaver Awardees to refine their story, provides learning resources to help them share their narrative with their community and with large audiences, and collaborates with PR firms to pitch their story at the local and national level.
At a time when most of what we hear on the media is about the things that divide us, these local trust builders’ stories are all about bringing people together to address shared needs.
Every cohort of the Weaver Awards attracts wide media coverage. For many, it’s their first time interacting with the media, but it’s never their last.
goodDay NWA announces some of the 2025 NWA Weaver Awardees
WBALtv covers a recognition by the Baltimore Ravens to the Weaver Awardees
Afro.com shares how the 2025 Baltimore Weaver Awardees are transforming their communities
WYPR covers Rebekah Offer, a 2024 Baltimore Weaver Awardee
Deepen connection between neighbors
A core part of the local partnerships is that it creates hubs for connection between neighbors. Weave provides communities with a model for events and gatherings that bring people together to build relationships, identify resources to tackle shared needs, and create opportunities for partnerships.
The main event communities host is Weave the People, which happens at least once a year. It usually happens in a large venue and invites hundreds of neighbors to come together, identify the issues in the community that folks can tackle together, and foster partnerships between individuals and organizations.
Folks find connection at the 2024 Wilkes Weave the People
Starting in late 2024, Weave started prototyping in northwest Arkansas a model of gatherings for folks to build relationships with one another called Coffee and Conversations. Neighbors organize these gatherings and meet at a coffee or tea shop and discuss a topic that is of interest to them. Over time, they start friendships. 14 of these gatherings have happened and many more are planned.
Another important space is the Ask and Offer Marketplaces. Awardees use these gatherings to identify areas where they need extra support, such as grant writing or social media. Then a local team of volunteers finds folks in the community, including other Awardees, who have those skills and invite them to help guide the Awardees. In a survey of Baltimore Awardees, folks identified these events as a highlight of the local partnership.
Only a month after getting an Award, I already built partnerships with other weavers that are helping me reach neighbors across northwest Arkansas that I would not have otherwise.
Beatriz Segura
2025 Northwest Arkansas Weaver Awardee
Get more folks engaged in tackling shared issues
The ultimate goal of these local partnerships is to help weavers grow their impact and inspire others to start weaving. The Weaver Awards give folks a platform to build relationships with different cohorts, access to spaces and resources where they can get more funding, and learning resources that strengthen their projects.
They gain a community of weavers and aspiring weavers. They meet on a regular basis and identify local needs they can tackle together.
Sometimes, these collaborations are about joy. At one of the meetings of the Wilkes weavers, neighbors brought up that there are few spaces where people from different generations can gather and build relationships with one another. So, they started a co-ed league, where folks come together to play all types of sports, from soccer to bocce ball. “There is so much division and seriousness happening right now. This is such a silly, fun way to connect with each other,” says Kelsey Crawford. “I’ve met so many people playing and we have so much fun together…. This group of people would never otherwise be together.”
Other times, they bring the community together to tackle painful issues. When Hurricane Helene devastated nearby Asheville in late 2024, Wilkes weavers brought neighbors together and shared their networks to collect aid and distribute food and emergency supplies. “So many people gave at every Weave gathering. Somebody even came from Charlotte with a huge truckload of supplies, because his wife’s hairdresser knew a weaver, who told her about our efforts,” says Jody Brady.
Earlier this year, a group of four Baltimore Weaver Awardees from different years joined forces to move beyond their neighborhood projects to work together on a city-wide summit for over 100 young people aimed at preventing opioid use and helping those struggling with addiction.
Yoga is often seen as self-care. Here, it’s about community care.
In Wilkesboro, NC, Weaver Awardee Susan Cogdill is expanding the weaving ethic to the young ones in her community. She started the Wilkes Yoga Sisterhood in September 2023, “to provide girls with a space where they can develop a community and connection, and build confidence while doing yoga,” she says. “The group is all about empowering a new generation of weavers.”
Many Weaver Awardees go through Weave’s courses on public narrative and public speaking. They learn how to share their story in a way that invites other folks to learn from their experience and start weaving where they live.
Some have joined the Weave Speakers Bureau, where they get specialized training with a story coach. Weave receives hundreds of requests for speakers and they get to tell their story nationwide in stages big and small, from SXSW and Aspen Ideas Festival, to classrooms and community halls.
They share the dream of building trusting communities where everyone thrives. They also give practical lessons to inspire others to join in weaving a stronger social fabric. They aren’t the usual experts, relying on books and credentials and telling us what to do. They are experts in inviting us into their way of living and showing us how to heal ourselves, our communities, and our nation.
Danielle Battle, a 2021 Baltimore Weaver Awardee, shared the stage with Nikki Stokes, a 2024 Baltimore Weaver Awardee, at SXSW EDU in Austin, TX.
