Monday, November 30, 2009

The psychological make-up of a city

I wonder what the best approach would be to determine the psychological make-up of a city. In Oslo and Warsaw I took the following approach. I asked some key cultural innovation drivers to describe their city to me as if it were a person. 'If Oslo is your friend, what would he/she be like?' This is a branding approach, making personae for a product. The problem is that cultural innovators are just one group to ask. Probably, immigrants would have a completely different picture of the city. Carol Coletta (CEOs for Cities) told me in Tilburg that she liked the idea that Manchester described itself as a collection of short stories, because the city (or any city) is too complex to make 1 single story. Is that the risk of all citybranding? That no single idea can capture something as organic and complex as a city?

Monday, November 23, 2009

Talking Heads on wheels

I just saw on Planetizen (http://www.planetizen.com/books/2010) The Top 10 books on urbanism. One was a really unexpected title: David Byrne's Bicycle Diaries. Whadda ya know? The former Talking Heads lead singer cycles thru a number of cities, sometimes with planners and politicians, musing on the built environment. They quote him, cycling thru Berlin, pondering on the non-human scale and utopian atmosphere of the city. Something else

Hidden stories


Keizerslanden in the Dutch hanseatic town of Deventer is a typical 60's/70's neighbourhood.

It's spacious, green and almost completely monofunctional. All looks peaceful and quiet, but it tops most of the social issues lists. Poverty, unemployment, isolation. You name it. Everyone of the 9.000 people there have a story. And the stories are untold. Because the stories are hidden. The housing corporation asked me to do a brainstorm with them. We came up with festivals, hiphop workshops and battles with the kids, a plave for good coffee and a conversation. I pointed them to the work of David Barrie in Britain. Most important, I believe is not what, but how you do it. Any event they choose should be designed, by designers and artists working closely together with the people at Keizerslanden. get the pride and energy going.