What is Creative Placemaking?

 

"Creative Placemaking is an evolving field of practice that intentionally leverages the power of the arts, culture and creativity to serve a community's interest while driving a broader agenda for change, growth and transformation in a way that also builds character and quality of place."

 

(www.artscapediy.org)

 

Each place is unique in terms of its characteristics, people and dynamics. Creative Placemaking is a co-creative process of uncovering and developing this uniqueness. Together with the community, we look at what makes a place special and which dreams could flourish in this place. As we plan and create, we build community at the same time, inviting diverse people to share their ideas and talents. This process leads to the creation of artistic interventions that can turn an eerie place into a treasured one or that uses/reclaims a public resource, like a vacant building. The artistic interventions serve as a temporary experiment; a means of engaging more people into imaging a better future and a way of testing whether the proposed ideas hit home. After this steps can be taken to develop the art projects in sustainable plans, involving multiple stakeholders like policy makers, formal and informal organizations, and local businesses, with the aim of finding wider support for a continued development and existence.

 

In Creative Placemaking we blend three disciplines:

 

• Art: to open imagination, to spark ideas into action, to experiment, engage and have fun. 

• Community Building: to build a safe space and a learning environment where barriers can be crossed and conflicts can be managed. 

• Mapping: to chart the patterns people move in, to find the resources and challenges of an area, to locate hot spots and cold spots in a community.