Lia Ghilardi's blog

Queen of Shops Saves Britain's High Street

2011-12-13T17:08:00.007Z

Celebrity retail expert Mary Portas has published her report into the UK's retail sector, telling the Government how to rejuvenate city centres and advocating 'town teams'. In the report there are 28 recommendations on what can be done by government, local authorities and business to help high streets revive. Of course, cultural planners, urban design and niche retail specialists have been arguing for special measures to be taken to revitalize town centres for ages... but that was yesterday and we are not celebrities...

Cultural Regeneration 2.0 Innovative approaches to regeneration

2011-10-19T14:28:00.002+01:00

Interesting debate to follow if you are a member of the Academy of Urbanism Group on Linkedin.

Riots in North London

2011-08-07T12:14:00.002+01:00

Public spending cuts and urban riots. Self explanatory.

Norway

2011-07-28T09:52:00.003+01:00

Our heart goes out to our friends and colleagues in Norway during these difficult times. Your openness and democratic values are an inspiration to us all.

Bastille Day Reading

2011-07-14T12:11:00.005+01:00

To celebrate the 14th of July in true French style, we suggest you revisit the Penguin collection of essays by Georges Perec titled Species of Spaces and Other Pieces . His reflections on how space begins and how it is made are playful and poetic. In essence, by asking the question: 'where is our space?' Perec shows that, above all, planning needs to fulfil human needs and urbanism has to be the ultimate goal of place-making.

Rethinking the Creative City

2011-07-01T18:24:00.002+01:00

Cities from all over the world are undergoing change and transformation, and some are developing interesting models of social and urban innovation, mostly out of necessity and only with hindsight do they see themselves as 'creative cities'. For at least a decade now the 'creative city' label has been used in some cases as an aspiration and in others as a brand, an unquestioned byword for enhanced urban competitiveness and boosted attraction factors. Following the global financial meltdown, cities more than ever need inspiration and forward-looking thinking. This is why we welcome the start of a frank and open debate about both the positives and the negatives of the 'creative city' approach. Here is an article on this subject published by Lia Ghilardi in the Czech architecture magazine ERA 21 in August 2009.

C. Landry: Creativity @ The Crossroads

Centre for Cities: Get Real with the Creative City

C. Leadbeater: The Completely Creative City

A. Pratt: Creative cities – the cultural industries and the creative class

GJ. Hospers and CJ.Pen: A View on Creative Cities beyond the Hype

O. Mould: Ranking Creative Cities: an exercise in futility?

M. Nathan: The Wrong Stuff

J. Peck: The creativity fix

Swedish Municipal Cultural Planning

2011-05-01T16:03:00.000+01:00

Cultural Planning is now firmly embedded in both policy and practice in Sweden. For those who can read Swedish, here is a very useful Handbook compiled by the Cultural Planning Network together with the Association of Swedish Municipalities. To get the Handbook please go to: www.sklkommentus.se

URBACT Report

2011-03-06T20:18:00.000Z

The report Cities Facing the Crisis was launched at the Annual Conference of the EU programme URBACT held in Liege at the beginning of December. The video featured here summarises the findings of the report and presents the key issues debated during two days of intense discussion and exchange.

URBACT cities facing the crisis (Part 1)
Uploaded by urbact. - Up-to-the minute news videos.

Rethinking Cultural Policy

2010-10-13T12:27:00.003+01:00

Culture Shock is a new paper by Demos calling for change in cultural policy, its function and delivery in the light of the changes taking place in technology, society and cultural production and consumption. You can download the paper here

Beautification or Regeneration?

2010-10-09T11:06:00.005+01:00

Thousand of volunteers dig in for I-70 project in Indianapolis
Could this be how the Big Society looks like? The killer answer is in the comment at the bottom of this article

Mercer 2010 Quality of Living Survey

2010-10-05T12:03:00.008+01:00

European cities still dominate the top ten ranking for quality of living with Canada, Australia and New Zealand also featuring.
Vienna scores highest for overall quality of living, while Calgary the Eco-city league's top dog.
Watch the short video discussing the criteria for city ranking.
Ranking tables and descriptions are to be found here.

The Other Side Of Branding

2010-10-01T09:25:00.006+01:00

For all those cities that are battling for pole position in the urban league... David Brier says...

Get Real with the Creative City

2010-09-20T20:09:00.006+01:00

Firm Intentions: Cities, Private Sector Jobs & The Coalition is the title of a new report by The Centre for Cities calling for more realism from the Coalition and cities across England pursuing sectors such as green industries or creative clusters. The document focuses on evidence that only a small number of cities will be able to develop specialist clusters in sectors identified as “growth” industries. These are more likely to emerge as a result of a natural or historic advantage – such as life sciences in Cambridge, with its highly qualified workforce and its University – than government intervention which has been found to be limited.
The report also identifies a “reality gap” at a time of shrinking public expenditure. 70% of cities in England believe they have a creative industries sector worth investing in, 46% of cities, a green or low carbon sector and 59% of cities, an advanced manufacturing cluster. More than one in four of England’s cities plan to support the emergence of all three, despite funding constraints.
Download the report here: http://www.centreforcities.org/firmintentions

Cultural Planning in Canada

2010-09-07T18:13:00.003+01:00

The internationally renown cultural planner Greg Baeker has just launched an edited publication called: Rediscovering the Wealth of Places (published in Canada by Municipal World). The book focuses on methods and case studies for the effective integration of culture in planning across municipal departments of Canadian cities. It is a practical and intelligently written ‘how to’ guide providing conclusive proof that municipal cultural mapping processes are often the key to effective policies for building creative advantage. By the way, just in case you were wondering, this applies to cities large and small both in Canada and outside! Well worth getting hold of it!

Gentrification and Its Discontents - Magazine - The Atlantic

2010-07-09T15:20:00.000+01:00

Gentrification and Its Discontents - Magazine - The Atlantic

The International Architecture Showcase - Mimetic City

2010-07-07T09:08:00.008+01:00

Between 19 June and 4 July the British Council, in partnership with the Architecture Foundation and more than 34 London-based embassies, presented a programme of exciting new work by practices from different countries on the theme of 'The Welcoming City'. The International Architecture Showcase featured exhibitions, installations, film screenings, debates and lectures hosted by diverse institutions across London, with the aim of challenging perceptions and opening minds to new possibilities in urban living. Check out the Mimetic City Istanbul event, a collaboration between Kerem Turker of Rada Design and Noema Research and Planning.
http://www.lfa2010.org/event.php?id=352&name=turkey_mimetic_city

Ostrava 2015

2010-05-24T12:33:00.004+01:00

The Czech city of Ostrava is currently preparing a bid for EUCOC 2015. On May 13 and 14, Lia Ghilardi and Colin Mercer visited the city and lead a series of talks and workshops on Cultural Planning and Mapping designed to help the city to focus on its cultural and creative economy priorities and aims.
In addition to that, on June 24-25 Ostrava will host a major conference on the soft factors influencing regional development. Check it out!

Danish Architects ADEPT and Noema Prequalify

2010-03-15T11:57:00.006Z

ADEPT and Noema have prequalified for the Køge Kyst parallel competition. This large culture-led development of a new central urban area is one of the biggest urban projects in Denmark at the moment. The team has proposed a very innovative approach to embedding culture in the regeneration of the harbour and the station area. Køge Kyst competing proposals are top secret until mid-April and the picture on the left belongs to another project by ADEPT!

Norwich in the final 4!

2010-02-25T17:11:00.002Z

It has just been announced that the City of Norwich is one of the four shortlisted for the title of the first UK City of Culture 2013. The other shortlisted cities are Birmingham, Derry and Sheffield.
We are pleased to say that Noema is currently working with Norwich on the next stage of the bid. Watch this space!

2010 EU Year of Combating Poverty and Social Exclusion

2010-01-17T13:53:00.004Z

2010 is the EU Year for combating poverty and social exclusion. Last year’s international economic and financial crisis is very likely to have long-term consequences for growth and employment across the EU and elsewhere. In this scenario, the piloting of proactive and enlightened new forms of urban governance at local level will be increasingly vital for cities large and small. We believe that the dissemination of urban and social innovation’s good practices is a key step in helping civic leaders and communities to find better solutions to the problems presented by the current crisis. This is why, as well as the development of practical projects and initiatives, our contribution to the EU Year against poverty will be each month to feature inspiring examples of social and urban innovation that have made a real change to the lives of the vulnerable and the excluded.

PICNIC 09 – Amsterdam

2009-10-05T12:13:00.004+01:00

What are the great breakthroughs that will change our lives in the coming decade? Will they improve our economy, deal with the environment and make our lives more livable? What are the alternative urban, social, digital, scenarios for our future?
PICNIC ’09 tackled all this and more.
If you have missed this truly unique three-day event, go to:
http://www.picnicnetwork.org/search/5905/en

The Digital City in the Next Five Years –Report

2009-08-19T14:07:00.005+01:00

Cap Digital’s main event within the International Futur en Seine Festival “The Digital City in the Next Five Years” (5-6 June 2009) brought together international guests (senior politicians and political advisors, urban planners, thinkers, digital creatives, designers, business, research) and their Paris City/Region equivalents to collaborate in discussing and designing the new paradigm of the digital city. Here is the link to downloading a comprehensive report about the event written by Andrew Bullen (Organiser of the International Programme for Futur en Seine).

Download

Costa Rica tops ‘Happy Planet Index’

2009-08-08T13:28:00.004+01:00

Can you measure the happiness of the planet?

The second global ranking of the ecological efficiency with which the world's nations deliver long and happy lives for the people who live there - the 'Happy Planet Index' - confirms a surprising picture of the relative wealth and progress of nations.
The report, The Happy Planet Index 2.0: Why good lives don't have to cost the earth, published by nef (new economics foundation) at the beginning of July, presents the results of the second global compilation of the Happy Planet Index (HPI).

The new HPI is based on improved data for 143 countries from around the world, representing 99 per cent of the world's population. The report shows that globally we are still far from achieving good lives within the Earth's finite resource limits. Latin America tops the HPI with Costa Rica as the 'greenest and happiest' country. Nine of the ten highest-scoring nations are Latin American, while the USA, China and India were all 'greener and happier' twenty years ago than they are today. By the way, the same index ranks the UK as 74th. A lot still to do?

World Future Digital Cities @ Futur en Seine 2009

2009-06-23T12:26:00.002+01:00

Here is a short video report by Frank Kresin of Waag (http://www.waag.org/) of the prototype and scenario building work developed during the Digital City event in Paris.
More soon.

The International “Futur en Seine” Festival

2009-06-03T12:27:00.002+01:00

Futur en Seine is a Festival of the Digital city, a unique cultural, technological and social event taking place between the 29th of May and the 7th of June across Paris and Ile de France region. For ten days, participants will be able to see, touch and interact with innovative technologies and applications, which will be part of daily life in the digital city of the future.

Futur en Seine also presents a pioneering international programme of debates and conferences about the state of cities and digital democracy. On the 5th and 6th of June Lia Ghilardi will be presenting Noema's more recent cultural and urban mapping projects at The Digital City in the Next Five Years Conference.

For the latest updates on the event see: http://www.futur-en-seine.org/en/world-future-digital-city/index.php

Testing the benefits of Cultural Planning

2009-06-01T18:46:00.002+01:00

Fablevision and the University of Strathclyde have, over the last three years, delivered a CPD course in Cultural Planning methodology aimed at public, private and voluntary sector practitioners. The report compiled by FairPley on behalf of the National Cultural Planning Forum contains an evaluation of both the course and the projects developed in Scotland using the Cultural Planning approach.

Download

Get creative with the internet...

2009-04-23T09:52:00.003+01:00

This weeks Time magazine business story has some tips for all creatives out there.

They say we are in the midst of a "start up boom" and suggest that there has been no better time than now to start an internet business with only a little seed money. Coining a term, LILO, which stands for "little in, a lot out," they note a new start up model which embodies the innovation principle of fast prototyping. Unlike the dotcom standard of creating an exhaustive business plan to attract investor dollars, the LILO model is that of putting your energy and effort into a quick-start on a shoestring...then thinking about the business plan later.

The Time story offers a 5-point How To guide from Silicon Valley start up expert Paul Graham:
1. Collaboration is king - find partners with skills and talents that complement yours.
2. Look for what's missing or broken in the marketplace - what people will pay for is a solution to a problem.
3. Follow the "fail fast" philosophy - get going quickly, simply and cheaply so you can see what works and what doesn't.
4. Respond/react/revise immediately in response to customers.
5. Be cheap. (Just as well!)

The Helsingborg + Competition

2009-03-25T11:55:00.013Z

In 2008, the municipality of Helsingborg in the South of Sweden launched a competition for proposals about the regeneration of a large former industrial district in the South of the city. The process adopted for the selection of the winning teams was unique in that it involved the setting up of an Expert Group which worked over the past six months with Helsingborg's key stakeholders to evaluate 5 proposals by different teams.

The Expert Group featured, among others, experts in the public realm (Gehl Architects) and cultural planning (Noema Research and Planning). On the 18th of March the Expert Group delivered their report to the Jury and a decision will be made over the next few weeks.

This 'Open Source' innovative approach to planning is an excellent example of how by drawing on the expertise of professionals from various disciplines civic leaders can deliver quality of life, distinctiveness, sustainability and competitiveness for their cities.
For more information on this ongoing process, contact Hakan Asmoarp, or Kristoffer Nilsson at Helsingborg's Planning Department.

Forum for Creative Europe

2009-03-25T11:20:00.008Z

On Thursday 26 March the Forum for Creative Europe will take place in Prague. Organized by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic in collaboration with European Commission, the conference is one of the main events of the European Year of Creativity and Innovation 2009. With over 50 speakers, artists, policy makers and practitioners from Europe and outside the Forum will be an opportunity to make the case for creativity in a world in turmoil.
Lia Ghilardi will be among the speakers and in her presentation she will discuss how cities can be more creative in the way they deal with competitiveness by focusing on their unique DNA defined across urban, social, human and cultural capital.

To follow the Forum live please go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J526Q-Wczbc
www.forumforcreativeeurope.cz/en

Cultural Planning and Place Making in Stockholm

2008-11-07T17:29:00.005Z

Noema has joined the Gehl Architects team (Copenhagen) in an international competition to design a new neighbourhood for Stockholm. The team has used the principles of Cultural Mapping to propose a new vision for sustainable living. See the Brief for the competition at Link

Cultural Planning and Cultural DNA: A Sustainable Approach to Placemaking

2008-11-07T16:18:00.009Z

A large gathering of members of the Union of Baltic Cities took place in Turku (Finland) on the 24th to the 27th of September 2008. The main subject of the event was the discussion of how to find the cultural DNA of places. Inspired by Lia Ghilardi, participants (mainly from the planning and urban development disciplines) spent two days documenting the distinctive character of Turku. The results of this work will be disseminated in a report which will be ready in December.
For information, please contact: Samuli Saarinen, Environmental and City Planning Department,
Master Plan Office,Turku
samuli.saarinen@turku.fi

Cultural Planning in Norwich

2008-11-07T15:52:00.002Z

Noema has been working with Norwich Culture Office and the Local Strategic Partnership on a series of workshops to train key stakeholders to use Cultural Planning as a tool for finding creative ways of improving the delivery of services.

I have invited Marion Catlin (Cultural Development Officer, Norwich City Council) to present the results of the work done in Norwich to my students of the MA in Cultural Policy and Management at City University, London.

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Gävle Conference

2008-06-23T09:36:00.001+01:00

The auditorium was full on the opening day of Konstcentrum’s seminars on cultural planning and art in public space. Artists and people working in cultural fields from all over Sweden mixed with interested local residents and international guests.
Lia Ghilardi, founder and director of Noema Research and Planning Ltd in London, talked about her method of mapping places from a cultural perspective. She began by cautioning against large architectural flagship projects which are often at risk of becoming " a second-life architecture for fantasy cities"...

Read more at: www.gavlekonstcentrum.se

Creative Cities Forum, Peking University

2008-06-11T14:47:00.002+01:00

Abstract: This paper deals with the issues associated with the use ofculture in urban regeneration and place-shaping and, through the use of practical examples of implementation, discusses cultural planning as a method for the delivery of integrated and sustainable cultural and urban development policies.

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Cultural Planning

2008-06-11T13:04:00.003+01:00

This is my brand of cultural planning

Cultural Mapping

2008-06-11T13:01:00.001+01:00

This is a short explanation of what is cultural mapping and how to do it

The Contribution of Outsiders to Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Cities

2008-04-11T18:37:00.004+01:00

Author: Lia Ghilardi
New thinking is needed on how diverse communities can live together and cooperate in productive harmony. This paper was written as part of a series of 'Thematic Case Studies' developed within the Intercultural City Project launched by Comedia Consultancy in 2006.

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Thinking Culturally About Place

2008-04-11T18:21:00.006+01:00

Think Piece in: Place Branding and Public Diplomacy
Vol.3, Number 4, October 2007, ISSN 1751-8040, Palgrave journals.
Franco Bianchini and Lia Ghilardi

Abstract:
This article explains the bases for an alternative approach to place branding and marketing, based on the disciplines of Cultural Mapping and Cultural Planning. After an introduction of key cultural mapping and planning concepts and issues, the article discusses some innovative practical examples of culturally sensitive place branding and marketing from Sweden and the UK, and concludes by outlining some components of a possible future agenda for action.

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Culture at the Centre: A strategic approach to successful and sustainable community-based regeneration

2008-04-11T18:16:00.001+01:00

Author: Lia Ghilardi
This is a summary of the document.

The report has been written on behalf of the National Cultural Planning Steering Group (N.C.P.S.G.).The aims of the document were: to assess the relevance and application of Cultural Planning as an overarching vision for cultural and community regeneration in Scotland; to propose Cultural Planning as a successful strategic tool for real community engagement in Community Planning, and to consolidate the understanding and participation of mainstream funders and decision makers. The report highlights some of the examples of existing good practice in the practical application of Cultural Planning as a basis for regeneration strategies at community and city levels. It also indicates the considerable potential of the approach if it were to be adequately supported at a national policy level in Scotland and makes some recommendations for implementation.

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Kulturplan Oresund

2008-04-11T17:55:00.001+01:00

In April 2006, The INTERREG - Kulturplan Oresund project has published a complete guide to Cultural Planning strategies. The Handbook, written by Lia Ghilardi especially for the project, contains an illustration of the methods and pracitcal issues involving the implementation of cultural strategies in different policy contexts.

The Danish version of the Handbook is available in published form (ISSN 1901-581X) in Kultur Pixi No.1, April 2006. Copies of the publication can be obtained by emailing: post@horisont-amba.dk

More information about the Kulturplan Oresund project can be found here.