Week 4: Creative cities

Lecture 1: "Creative cities"


Katie presented the lecture today on the topic "creative cities". Richard Florida who developed the term "Creative cities" analysed Why creative people inhabit certain areas over others,  what are the factors that draw them to these places? He found that such cities were often clustered around industry as these were the places where their creative talents could be truly utilised.  He identified that the truly successful creative cities had a high population of "gays" and "Bohemians" who were seemingly more open to new ideas and willing to explore them. An extension of the term was the "Creative class" which described people within these cities whose primary role  was to create meaningful new forms. The three T's; technology, talent and tolerance introduced the concept of the creative class.


Class work: Group concept development and commitee discussion.


The class divided into our specific groups after the lecture in order to discuss ideas and possible solutions for the final project. Many ideas where brought to the table by the group. The most popular two were discussed further, these where a carnival game themed history quiz, and a green space for the street.


The green space concept involved the creation of some sort of living space from plant matter. It would include a grass couch at the for front of the design and other green furniture to create an out door green room. The space would also allow visitors to style and personalise their own grass heads to take home from the exhibition. The concept of taking something or adding something to the work was something very important to the group in order for the message to truly get through to people.


 The concept itself looked at how where there is green (nature) there is people and spaces are often more livable where nature is present. The group wants to remind visitors that green is right on their doorstep and not to take it for granted as their are spaces, like Darlinghurst where green is not present and this can often detract from human activity within the spaces. Basically the group is looking to put life back into Foley street.This concept was seemingly the one with the most potential and will be developed further by the group.  


After discussing group projects the class split into committee roles. At this point in the project the commitee that i am apart of, infrastructure, does not have allot to discuss as we do not know the size and quantity of what needs to be set up in each exhibition. The group however discussed possible contacts with removalist company's that could help us transport the projects to and from the site. 


Lecture 2: Green living 2030


Glen from Sydney city council presented the second lecture today on the events and goals that the council is working towards achieving by 2030 and how our project could assist with or be impacted by this.We were presented with information on the population and congestion of Sydney city and Glen identified the main goals of the council to create a greener, more connected, global city. The concept of "green living presented by Glen is something that our group can really address in our green space concept.