PHOTOS: Best Superwoman, Best Marathon Mom Among Awards Celebrating The People Of Windsor

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“It’s like we’re throwing a party just for you, for the things that you do best,” said Rosina Riccardo.

And that’s exactly what she did.

Riccardo, Co-Host of the Best of Awards event at the Civic Space, as well as a member of Broken City Lab, along with her partner Joshua Babcock, program coordinator for the Civic Space and member of Broken City Lab, teamed up to create The Best Of Awards Event.

The awards night was a bittersweet evening for all involved, as it not only showcased the amazing people in Windsor, but it was also the last event the Civic Space will hold. The Civic Space, a project by Broken City Lab, is at the end of its two-year funding from Trillium and those involved wanted to throw an event that would send them out with a bang.

“We wanted to make it special for them,” said Riccardo. “It’s an event for the people and you can tell somebody thank you for doing this, and you’re awesome at this, but this way it makes it more official.”

The idea was, Broken City Lab and the Civic Space would give Windsor and Essex residents a chance to nominate the people they thought did amazing things every day and give them the chance to immortalize their accomplishments on a trophy. The event brought out 57 award winners to a celebration with their nominators, all at no cost to the participants.

“We wanted to, instead of celebrating the large things that we all do, instead to celebrate the smaller things that we all do,” said Babcock.

While the intent was to celebrate the smaller things, many nominees and recipients saw the awards as big things. Melissa Kinghorn nominated her father, Wayne Kinghorn, for best window washer, an award which says more about him than the title and description she offered.

“I’m truly proud of his work and though I may not tell him enough I think that his hard work has shown me as an individual what it is to make a life’s work out of something,” said Kinghorn. “Every opportunity I’ve had in my life is because of him, so thanks dad and Happy Mother’s Day.”

Her father however said he had no idea where she was taking him, as he was under the impression she was taking him out for a meal. He wasn’t the only one to be surprised though, when Kinghorn was showing her father his nomination she spotted two nominations for herself.

“I came down and surprisingly enough I see my name is up on here for being the best advocate for suicide awareness and best mental health advocate as well,” said Kinghorn. “I have no idea who nominated me, but I’m just reading my nominations and I’m humbled that not only one but two people thought I was worthy of an award…It’s great to know there’s still people that will recognize me.”

The awards ranged in individuality from best soup connoisseur, to best mom, best at making you feel best, and the most ironic according to its recipient, best Windsorite.

“I’m not even from here,” said Murad Erzinclioglu. “I was born and raised in the Niagra region, I moved down here for school and I just fell in love with the community and I’ve been here ever since so to be recognized as somebody who’s valuable to that community is a really nice piece of recognition for sure…there’s like 230,000 people in Windsor and some how I was recognized as being the best one out of all of them.”

Babcock said after two years of the Civic Space project, he’s proud of everything they’ve done here but he thinks it’s time to move forward. While they’re not sure what the plan is for the next Broken City Lab project, he’s happy with all they’ve done and the awards night was the perfect way to sum it all up.