Meet Atiuh Cervantes ‘14, BA HIAA

Co-lead on Village SF, a wellness hub in the heart of the first American Indian Cultural District in San Francisco's Mission neighborhood. 

"My career…

has always lived at the intersection of market operations, business intelligence, and data, spanning industries from entertainment and insurance to finance and tech. In my current role, I've been able to use skills like advanced modeling along with my fast-paced techie work ethic into a mission-driven space. As co-lead on my project, I manage a small but mighty team that operates with the same startup-style and goal oriented mindset--only here, we apply it to achieving our philanthropic goals. In less than a year, we've raised nearly $70M.

I am currently co-leader…

for a project called the Village SF, a 6-story wellness hub starting construction in spring 2026 in the heart of the first American Indian Culture District, in San Francisco's Mission neighborhood. The initiative builds on Friendship House's 60+ years as the country's oldest American Indian-led social services nonprofit. In the late 70's, our founder, Helen Waukazoo (Navajo), pioneered a model of care/recovery that centered traditional healing practices alongside western evidence-based methodologies--setting the standard for American Indian organizations nationwide. Today, alongside my co-lead Peter Bratt, Capital Campaign Director Bonnie Wolf, and our incredible team and long list of supporters, we are leading fundraising for the new build, overseeing design of both the structure and its expanded programming, expanding housing opportunities for urban Indigenous peoples, and advancing a major urban greening effort we call the Green Cultural Zone. It's a massive undertaking that centers Indigenous values--most importantly, the belief that we are all related--all of us are a part of our environment, not separate from it. We’re trying to really center sustainability in everything we do while we continue to design a future where we center Indigenous values while combining them with the best that western society has to offer. For example, our work has helped get MediCal to cover traditional healing services in California, Washington, Oregon, and Arizona as of this year. 

My advice for undergrads in HIAA is…

stay curious and keep devoting time to learning, and don't stop doing your art--whatever form that may take. Always give whatever you're working on 100% simply to practice maintaining a high-level of quality in your work. Most importantly of all--don't let go of your desire to maintain a career in the arts if that's your goal. It's hard, but nothing worth doing is easy--just find a way to support it and yourself, of course. I took a 10-year roundabout journey through corporate American/tech just to find myself back using my creative brain in a design space and able to apply what I learned at Brown/RISD in a real world setting. 

Brown allowed me to… 

practice a form of critical thinking that's powerful for innovation--a non-siloed way of viewing the world. Brown was a place where nerds just love to learn so much--and that's its greatest gift. The open curriculum allowed me to take music classes, Africana Studies classes, my HIAA courses and RISD courses alongside Italian studies classes. Once you leave school, I think most of us come to realize just how interconnected the world around us is--and Brown can prepare you for this really well. 

I'm most excited by… 

the fact that--much like a startup--we do so many different things throughout each day and ALL activities are 1000% mission-driven. One day I will be helping form new legal entities or writing copy for a media release, and the next I'll be writing and editing grant applications. One week I will be in deep design discussions with partners/future tenants and the next I'll be working with the SF Planning Department (I am also a Fellow with the City) to inform Housing policy and be a voice for American Indians within City government. I get to cause tangible impacts by finding creative solutions to design questions, grant writing, and policy questions--all in a day's work. These days it feels pretty revolutionary to do this kind of work. 

My current project…

the Village SF wellness hub will be a six-story, LEED-gold targeted facility, already recognized with awards from the California Green Building Council and the US Forest Service for its environmental justice leadership. Three floors are dedicated to recovery housing for women and mothers so they can seek treatment without losing custody of their children. We're also building an Indigenous Futures Tech Hub to incubate Native-led startups and reclaim technology as a tool for economic sovereignty, plus a Native café and teaching kitchen led by Chef Crystal Wahpepah where clients can learn culinary and business skills. Above it all will be our rooftop garden-farm, which will grow thousands of pounds of traditional foods and medicines each year and anchor the Green Cultural Zone to revitalize a former industrial neighborhood--reimagining this section of San Francisco as an urban forest. We are also negotiating a first of its kind lease with the City of San Francisco to steward ~3 acres of land within Golden Gate Park and turning these acres into a ceremonial site and another community garden where American Indians can reclaim urban space and the public can learn about Indigenous ecological practices, and cultures. 

I’m proud and grateful to be doing this work.'

Contact Atiuh Cervantes

IG @atiuhhawk and @friendshiphousesf

LinkedIn for Atiuh Cervantes and Friendship House