Polygraph (visually-driven essays) has a great piece called, The Entire History of Kickstarter Projects, Broken Down by City. What they did was look at 88,475 Kickstarter projects to map the various creative communities across the US.
Here’s a snapshot (you may need to zoom in):
In general, Kickstarter in the US sees a high concentration of music projects (24%) and film & video projects (19%). But where it gets interesting is to see which cities over-represent in certain categories.
New York = film & video, theater, and dance
Los Angeles = film & video (not surprisingly 45% of all projects)
San Francisco = design and tech
Chicago = theater
Detroit = music
Nashville = music (76% of all projects!)
They also measured the size of each project (number of backers) and created these neat bubble diagrams:
Above is New York. Red is music. Orange is film. And yellow is theater.
I also like their explanation for why they did this project:
Pretty much all existing attempts to map creative communities use census and jobs data. But creative efforts are often side-hustles. They’re garage/basement/cottage industries that will not appear in a census.
It’s true. This data should be a much better capture of each city’s creative soul.
One of my biggest pet peeves is when cities copy things from other cities.
Let me give you an example. Whenever I see one of those red double decker tourist buses roaming around Toronto, I always look to see if it’s the type that has London signage and destinations plastered all over it. And when it is, I cringe. (I saw one earlier today.)
Why would anyone design a tourist bus that makes you feel like you’re half in another city? I don’t get it. The whole reason people are getting on that bus is because they’ve come to visit this city. It should make you feel like you’re here and nowhere else. It should feel locally authentic.
To be clear, I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be learning from other cities and building on top of other’s great ideas. That’s precisely what we should all be doing. I’m talking about kitschy copies with little additional thought put into them. And I can think of many examples beyond just tourist buses.
Am I just being pedantic?
What about you? Any urban pet peeves?
This apartment is such a great idea:
Let me explain.
Freunde von Freunden (FvF) is a Berlin-based publication that documents inspiring people from creative and cultural backgrounds. If you don’t read their stuff, I think you should. Sample: Here’s an interview with Chang Lin. He is Creative Director at Zalando and lives in Mitte, Berlin. I always find it fascinating to see how people live.
In 2014, FvF decided to bridge the online and offline worlds and open up their first “apartment” in Berlin. They refer to it as: The FvF Apartment - Visions for Urban Living. And they describe it like so:
“The apartment has been designed to be fully adaptable to the diverse and often unexpected scenarios of everyday life, reflecting how a creative, mobile and digitally-oriented generation lives. It serves not only as a platform for innovative products from friends and partners, but as a unique venue for events, workshops, and presentations.”
Basically, the space serves as one part apartment and one part venue. They have used it as a pop-up shop, as a stage for photo and film productions, as a place for distillers to host private tastings, and the list goes.
Again, I think this is such a great idea as a brand extension. It is giving me all kinds of ideas and so I thought I would share it with you all today as well.
Image: The FvF Apartment