The melody of the city of Athens
Thucydides: “The people are the city” (Historiai, 7.77.7 ἄνδρες γὰρ πόλις)
Shakespeare: “What is the city but the people?” (Coriolanus, Act 3, Scene 1)
The Design Thinking Lab on the subject “Cultural Marketing” was an exciting journey with several stations. This research and master-plan was born and developed under the supervision of Professor
in the framework of the course “Athens Co-creation City Branding Project”, a virtual weekly mini co-creation workshop about cultural marketing at the postgraduate program “MA in Cultural Management, Communication and Media” at Panteion University of Athens.During the whole course during his academic year, we realized that it is absolutely necessary to first broaden our horizon of knowledge about cities, so as to gain insight of the features rendering them livable, sustainable, resilient and smart and then focus on the project about our city of interest. The stations of this journey are depicted on the following map and then shortly analyzed.
Two interesting interviews played a major role in our project. The first interview was with Joanna, a digital nomad living in Athens and the second one was with the Mayor, Kostas Bakogiannis. We also recorded a podcast about Athens, which presents seven different points of view, regarding the Athenian experience so far.
Amsterdam
In terms of a successful city rebranding campaign, Amsterdam achieved its full potential by turning its city’s weaknesses into strengths. We are all familiar with the idea of Amsterdam as a city of sex drugs and rock and roll. However, through its renewed identity, Amsterdam is seen as a city of meetings, canals, culture, knowledge and business. The brand of Amsterdam focuses on sixteen different dimensions, seen both through the eyes of inhabitants and visitors.
Austin Texas
Dreamed up in 1986 by a few journalists and founded in 1987 in Austin Texas, SXSW, an inaugural Music Festival, has emerged as the premier destination for creatives across the globe. Today’s festival, with the massive impact on economy and infrastructure, may be dramatically different from its humble beginnings, but it still epitomizes the spirit of music traditions and the vibrant multicultural canvas throughout the Southwestern United States. Austin has succeeded in scaling up its heritage.
Kyoto
Kyoto is a city of rich history and extreme potential. Being the cultural capital of Japan, the center of television and film industry and the host to numerous festivals and themed events, the city has created its own unique branding identity. Combining modern with traditional, some of its features are its environmental quality, a globally minded population and its high tolerance policies. To the eyes of the world, Kyoto is an especially livable city and a site of strong heritage.
Livable cities
Our research also focused on the positioning of Athens in the global ranking of the most Livable Cities –an annual ranking of the living conditions that is created by five components: Stability (25%), Culture & Environment (25%), Healthcare (20%), Infrastructure (20%) and Education (10%)-. In addition to emergency services a livable city must also generate a sense of community, offer hospitable settings for all, especially young people, develop social skills, a sense of autonomy and identity. Although Athens amassed a score of 72%, it is not included in the 25 most livable cities (Monocle, 2019).
Resilient cities
The concept of resilience has become crucial in terms of the cities’ preparation for the future, that is, a city’s commitment to social justice, ability to create a sustainable source of energy, willingness to identify and challenge the possibility of any disaster to damage the community: Plan, prepare, mitigate, when necessary, respond, recover, adapt. Therefore, we studied examples of on-the-ground resiliency initiatives that are making real improvements in lives, and enhancements that may enable the given cities to continue to thrive in the future. The aim of this study was to finally reflect on Athens’ Resilience Strategy, with its meticulously worked out pillars, goals and actions as mapped on the Sustainable Development Plan, as well as to understand the interdependencies between the Resilience Strategy and other plans of the city.
Emerging image of Athens
International media lately highlight Athens as a:
- Reviving city attracting artists, curators & digital nomads
- Startup hub
- Rising arts and culture scene
- City of camaraderie and liveliness
- City always new
The main challenge
Branding a city begins with focusing on the city’s distinctive character, so as to construct its coherent identity that can be developed along with a vision embracing and engaging all facets of society. Athens is an ancient as well as a modern city (Frampton 2007, Woditsch 2018). Proud of its heritage and embarrassed at the same time, as if it didn’t know what to do with it, in accordance with Seferis’ verses:
“I woke with this marble head in my hands; it exhausts my elbow and I don’t know where to put it down”.
(Mythistorema by George Seferis, translated by Edmund Keeley)
So the main challenge is to build a brand of Athens based on its unique character and potential. Actually, the city is constantly improving according to the relevant ratings and evaluations: Athens was named “The European Capital of Innovation 2018” by the European Commission, according to Carlos Moedas, Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation:
“Athens stands out as an example that a city facing many challenges can achieve great things. Through innovation, Athens has found a new purpose to turn around the economic and social crisis. It is proof that it’s not the difficulties but how you raise yourself above them that matters.”
Athens current brand positioning is relatively high among:
- Cities for meetings and events globally
- Places to live for digital nomads
- Most walkable cities
- Cities of opportunities
On the other hand, Athens is evaluated relatively low among Smart cities. The unstable image of the city makes a persuasive branding narrative more necessary and citizen engagement more demanding. This narrative should pay homage to the city’s cultural legacy without overshadowing current achievements, supporting Athens’ development to a more metropolitan and international hub.
What makes Athens unique
It is a common place that Athens is a charming city. When it comes to Athens’ uniqueness it seems that it is a matter of the combination of heritage and modernity. In an attempt to follow today’s trend for innovation, the 4th Euro-Mediterranean Conference-Exhibition which took place in Athens last October focused on smart, blue cities. The challenge, though, even in our days is to preserve the past and prepare the future simultaneously.
Athens city has to face its own challenges. Implanting trust and confidence among citizens features as a main challenge. A sense of belonging can motivate residents in co-creating the brand of a future-focused city. The so-called engagement is deemed to be a significant tool for cities.
In the post-Covid-19 era digital literacy can make things faster and easier. To cut a long story short a digitalized environment is the ideal place for creative and knowledge-based jobs.
Governance, especially in Greece, is usually a wedge issue. So, quality of governance and transparency can contribute in constructing better communications and collaboration between stakeholders and decision makers. Networking leads to scale-up.
Also, a circular approach waste-wise and respect for green and open public spaces concludes the Athenian challenges.
No one can deny the historic value of Athens. Many people believe that this city is the cultural capital because of its glorious past. Beyond that today Athens incorporates strengths such as authenticity, innovation, sustainability. The life-cost remains low while the city offers a gateway to Greek islands. Contemporary art and cultural events, gastronomy and nightlife comprise the Athenian mentality.
Athens transforms…or not?
Openness and tolerance is one of the main Athens features in the Athenian environment, where there are over 40 religions. Also, Athens does respond to challenges such as at the Olympic games in 2004. There are other successful projects such as Metro, Attiki motorway, Archaeological (“Grand”) promenade, bus real time information system, and district gentrification.
In the post-Covid19 era opportunities arise since Athens features as a world cultural hub (art & hub spots, movie hub). The same time developing culinary city diplomacy is an advantage where Athens Riviera is approachable for every resident.
The main competitors of Athens are believed to be Lisbon, Madrid and Istanbul. Lisbon is well-known as “hip-cheap-innovative” and for its great working environments. The fact that Lisbon spent quite some time in managing an entire project for the appropriate working environment circumstances, is very remarkable.
Compared to Athens, Madrid appears to be gaining points in the infrastructure sector, since it is easier to move around the city. Another advantage Madrid has to offer is the digital transformation which will introduce, develop and expand new information and communication technologies. Moreover, Madrid offers a safer environment in terms of health and security and is believed to be more convenient regarding the business sector.
The third competitor of Athens is Istanbul. In this case the advantages of Athens outweigh the disadvantages. Istanbul is presented as a less sustainable, although a more livable city. On the one hand Athens has to offer a more intellectual capital but on the other hand it is easier to move around Istanbul.
We prefer to liken our vision of Athens with a melody, where both residents and policy makers co-compose it.
The main challenge is to combine the modern element with a traditional touch. We worked with the idea of a long term branding that can direct the city’s development and will focus on the collaboration of the citizens and will gain international recognition. The branding mixture will be evolving overtime and will provide a multilayered, transformative and sustainable result.
In order to make the brand appealing our idea is to create city-powered applications that would allow every resident, emphasizing on children and teenagers, to become the co-creator of the new Athenian brand.
Most importantly visitors should play a vital part as well. By providing them with the appropriate stimuli, we need to treat them not as tourists but as inhabitants, providing them with the opportunity to play their part in the city’s rebranding.
Establishing and communicating Athens’ brand cannot be a one-dimension project. Apart from the official authorities of the city, mainly Athens Municipality, it is crucial to build partnerships, engage stakeholders, different groups of regional actors so that Athens achieves visibility and distinguishes itself in the international field. Involving disparate organizations in action ensures that they are willing to build a coherent, cooperative effort.
From this perspective our proposal points in some important international organizations such as Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) due to its experience in the pre-opening audience engagement of Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center (SNFCC) — a sustainable, world-class cultural, educational and recreational urban complex — or the “The Return to Public Space” a project about the evolving role and meaning of public space.
Onassis Foundation’s experience in designing City rebranding projects, e.g. “Rethink Athens” and innovative programs in terms of city experiences, e.g. supporting artist’s collaboration, youth culture, is also very important for the co-creation of city branding.
University institutions like National Kapodistrian University of Athens, Panteion University of Social & Political Sciences and National Technical University of Athens, can also contribute by planning and applying public opinion surveys, implementing the project management actions, designing, maintaining and updating digital platforms, organizing seminars and conferences for the actors involved.
Media labs research groups can also cooperate, as they have the experience and potential to propose new strategies in terms of creating attractive places where people live and work, in addition to the mobility systems that connect them, in order to meet the profound challenges of the future.
Our goal is to attract wealth creators including scientists, entrepreneurs and designers, who will develop new businesses. Some of them are Hugo Wheeler, founder and director of Hot Wheels Gallery on Patision Street, David Fenwick, artist and entrepreneur, Alexander Jaschik, photographer, cinematographer film director from Germany and Vassia Kostara, a Greek designer and influencer, designing clothes from recycled materials and leading projects with environmental goals.
We believe that the catalyst for the city’s evolution is to re-imagine the relationship between the citizens and the City Hall, motivating the population to take part in Athens’ branding. All in all, Athens has the potential to be modern, livable, to inspire, to innovate and attract people based on its classical values and thanks to its current achievements.
You can also check here our slide deck.
Keep calm and listen to our original podcast describing the Athenian experience!
Los Creativos is a team of innovative, proactive and creative postgraduate students at Panteion University.
, , , , traveled all together across the city branding universe.Mentor Professor led the way.
To be continued…
REFERENCES-BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Frampton, K. (2007). Modern Architecture. A Critical History. London: Thames & Hudson.
- Lynch, K. (1960). The Image of the City. Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
- Seferis George (2014). Collected Poems, 1924–1955. Keeley Edmund & Sherrard Philip (translation & editing) Bilingual Edition. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
- Woditsch, R. (2018). The Public Private House. Modern Athens and its Polykatoikia. Zurich: Park Books.
- Zhou, B., Liu, L., Oliva, A., and Torralba, A. (2014). “Recognizing City Identity via Attribute Analysis of Geo-tagged Images.” Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 519–534.
