This past Monday, I got together with David Wex (of Urban Capital) and Rick Sole (my business partner) for a night of DJ'ing electronic music. We called it our inaugural developer rave session and it was a ton of fun. I (mostly) had no idea what I was doing. Rick and David were great. And together, we played to a sold out crowd that consisted of two of our wives.

David was also kind enough to host us at his bar Lisbon Hotel (it's closed on Mondays). Which is why when I posted some of the above photos on X, Affan Imran asked if we are calling ourselves the Lisbon House Mafia. I thought that was pretty good. And since I'm still in search of a proper DJ name, that's the title of today's post.

Maybe when we do this again, we'll open it up to more than 2 people. Maybe.

First, the why. The why is to build better cities. And it's as simple as that. I love cities. The team loves cities. And we all feel a great sense of responsibility when it comes to doing our part to make them more prosperous, more beautiful, and overall better places to live and work.

It is for this reason that Globizen refers to itself as a city builder. We obviously didn't invent this moniker, but we do take it seriously. And our specific intent is to be both a city-building company and a city-building community.

What this means is that we do the things that most companies do, including trying to make money. But in parallel to this, we also aspire to create a community of like-minded city builders.

City building isn't just about real estate development. It's also about the artist that just painted a mural, the local restauranteur that just opened up a new concept, and the individual that just did something, whatever that may be, to improve their community.

We would like to do our part to celebrate these actions and support more of them. This is how we want to build.

As for what we actually do, we are developers of creative mixed-use infill projects. Currently, we are developing and managing projects on our own account (we invested our own equity) and on behalf of great partners. But in all cases, we have a consistent investment philosophy and approach to development:

• Focus on fundamentals

• Search for overlooked assets and opportunities

• Embrace non-consensus views

• Create value by innovating with design, culture, and technology

• Execute with discipline and passion

• Think long term

We are actively looking for new development opportunities. We are also exploring/underwriting a number of income-producing asset strategies. If you'd like to pitch us a site or project, or you just want to grab a coffee somewhere cool, please feel free to send me an email (brandon.donnelly@globizen.com).

As some of you may have gleaned from this recent RENX article, I have moved on from my development position at Slate Asset Management to focus exclusively on Globizen. After 8 very productive and exciting years at the company, it was time.

I joined Slate in 2016 to help start the development group. Here is the post that I wrote back then. And it all came about because of a coffee meeting at Starbucks at the corner of Yonge & King.

At the time, Lucas Manuel was looking to hire someone, and so our mutual friend, Kieran Boyd, connected us with the expectation that I would make some industry introductions. But at the end of our meeting, Lucas was quick to say, "actually, I think you should come join Slate."

And obviously, that's what I did.

Fast forward to today, and Slate has grown into a global investment and asset management company with $13 billion of assets under management across Canada, the US, and Europe. And within this platform is a supremely talented development group with an awesome portfolio of sites and projects.

Thankfully though, this is not a goodbye. Myself and the Globizen team will still be working very closely with Slate on a handful of development projects, including One Delisle and Corktown. And the intent is that we will continue to work on new projects together in the future.

I learned a lot during my time at Slate, and I have so much respect for Blair and Brady Welch and the rest of the partners. They have built an incredible global company and assembled some of the most creative, entrepreneurial, and smartest people I have ever worked with.

Thank you for everything over the last 8 years.

So what's the plan for Globizen? This will be the topic of a follow-up post.