What does well-being have to do with the economy have to do with the creative industries? For the purposes of this entry, let’s use Gallup’s well-being that measures life evaluation, emotional health, physical health, healthy behavior, work environment and basic access (definitions of each here); GDP for the economy; and the creative class for the creative industries.

Thanks to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, cities are now measured for happiness, with the San Jose, Washington DC,

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We all know the economy needs jobs. Not industrial economy jobs, which we’re transitioning away from, but knowledge economy jobs. But where did the Apples, Microsofts and HPs that fuel today’s economy come from? That’s right, startups.

Our entry Gazelles + Economic Gardening = Prosperity highlighted this very trend back in 2003. In 2007, we posted how every neighborhood needs a coworking space. Today we’re in a jobs crisis. The time is right to converge these two trends.

First, Blake

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From a creative economy point of view, are towns, cities and even regions not within a ‘mega-region’ (10 to 50 million people) not worth investing significantly in?

From the Prospect article, Ruse of the Creative Class, responding to the premise behind economist Richard Florida’s upcoming book, The Great Reset: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity,

In a warm-up to his next book, Florida has been arguing that the recession has so decimated many cities and regions

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The motivating factor behind writing entries for this blog is that I get to work directly with progressive creatives and developers to crowdsource these concepts into built reality.

So, considering the state of the economy, what are creatives’ solution in how the development of a building can become a symbol for economic growth? The following framework of a building will soon be crowdsourced in Washington DC as an answer:

- Local, independent businesses on the ground floor. Not only do local

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How much of a greater impact do local retailers have on nationals? The Urban Conservancy recently completed a study with Civic Economics to answer just that, called Thinking Outside the Box: A Report on Independent Merchants and the New Orleans Economy. Keep in mind this is just economics, and not considering the cultural impact on the local neighborhood.

According to the study, when compared to leading chain competitors on a per square foot basis, local retailers:
- generate twice the annual

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New Orleans is attracting scores of entrepreneurs and small businesses, and there hasn’t been a better time to be a creative. “There has never been a better time in Louisiana for the creative class to thrive,” says state lieutenant governor, Mitchell J. Landrieu. Why such a bold statement?

First of all, the evidence.
- New Orleans’ metro area gained 100,000 nonfarm, post-Katrina jobs from October 2005 to June 2009, and by 2016 is expected to grow 24% from 2006 levels to 98.8% of

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For the purpose of understanding the evolution of our economy and our quality of life, if there was ever one definitive graphic, this is it. However, to understand the current creative, knowledge-based, whole new mind economy from an individual’s point of view, you have to get to know the work at ThinkStudio, a global think tank based in Switzerland.

The chart above illustrates the direct economy, where “customer knowledge is replacing producer knowledge”. ThinkStudio illustrates this

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According to economist Richard Florida in his recent article, the solution posited by the title of his recent Atlantic Monthly article, How the Crash Will Reshape America, is through a renewed emphasis on velocity and density. This is also the article that prompted Suburbia R.I.P. in Fast Company Magazine.

Regarding how we started to get into this mess,  “For the generation that grew up during the Depression and was inclined to pinch pennies, policies that encouraged freer spending were

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Arlington County, Virginia has long been considered a creative class mecca, with a high concentration of educated knowledge workers. Arlington has also been attracting cultural creatives (socially and environmentally conscious) and rengens (those effecting a renaissance level of change), all three of which are defined on this site as creatives.

One thing missing though, was an identifiable community of creatives that could collaborate to define Arlington’s creative economic and culture

On July 1, 2007 Helen Johnson and Josh McManus entrepreneurially initiated a three-month research and planning project focused on studying the engagement of creatives in the city with the intention of gaining a better understanding of how to retain and attract them, crucial to its transition to a post-industrial knowledge economy.

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Perhaps too many people buying homes they couldn’t afford wasn’t the problem behind the Wall Street collapse, but a symptom. The real problem may be that there are too many homes out on the market that people could never afford in the first place. In other words, the average U.S. American can’t afford $300,000 for a home, as is the going rate in many cities. So rather than lend out more money to buy homes people can’t afford, that banks can’t back, perhaps the real solution is addressing the

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When it comes to industrial design, Milan, Italy is a world capital, leaders in fashion and architecture and home to Alfa Romeo and Fiera Milano, the largest trade fair complex in the world. There is no product
design equivalent in the U.S., but Cleveland, Ohio is poising itself to take on that mantle. What’s the point? For one, design is found to be correlated to economic growth. If you’re wondering how industrial design makes an impact, think of Apple and their influence.

In the heart of

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In 1956 the Federal Aid Highway Act ushered in the auto age, with the U.S. government funding 90% of the costs to build 41,000 miles of interstate highways over 20 years, an equivalent of $200 billion today. Highways are still being built, but they’re also coming down as cities are realizing that a digital infrastructure (ie the internet; wi-fi, fiber optic, cellular, satellite networks) negates a continued need for heavy asphalt investment, and at a much lower economic, environmental and

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What’s leading economic growth in our cities?

Robert Litan, VP of Research and Policy at the Kaufmann Foundation* and director of Economic Studies at the Brookings Institution**, concludes that more of our growth today is generated by entrepreneurial or newer companies. He answers the following question in this interview from Smart City Radio:

Smart City Radio: “If you were advising a local urban leader on how he or she could encourage the start up of businesses that would have a good chance

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I first profiled Tryst back in 2003 as a popular coffeehouse third place in Adams Morgan, Washington DC. But five years later, ten years after it first opened, it’s not only become a neighborhood institution, but it really should be seen as a contemporary model for job creation.

Here’s the big picture:

1. A majority of big businesses come from small businesses, and small businesses are started by entrepreneurs… from their homes.
2. Many (not all) entrepreneurs who tried working exclusively

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If you’re looking to establish a beta community to crowdsource a natural cultural district (kudos to those of you who don’t have to click on the words to know what’s being talked about here), it starts with third places, events and scenes.

Third places. Most of you know what third places are - where you feel comfortable hanging out when you’re not at home or at work. A community starts with a third place so people can meet face to face, whether it’s a coffeehouse, a cafe/bookstore, or a

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Utilizing the Fifth Discipline principles of systems thinking, we bring to you a representation of why cities, especially their economic development departments that manage the largest of budgets, choose to invest in the outdated practice of landing ‘the big one’ rather than cultivating its own creative economy that is known to create jobs more effectively.

The Context:  First of all, it’s important to understand the long tail. The vertical axis in the graph to the left is economic output,

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Today’s entry will be a little uncommon, but rather extraordinary as we present Urban Cultures’ detailed presentation behind their Cultural Quarters: Necessary Conditions and Success Factors checklist. There really are few if any firms that have such fine-grain knowledge in helping cities invest in such places, and we’re glad to be associated with them.

The treatise follows:

An essential prerequisite for a vibrant cultural quarter is the presence of cultural activity, and this should include

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