using festival signals to inform Do Fest 2019 design
we love festivals of doing!
This 3 minute film of Do Fest Dudley 2017 offers a powerful reminder of the joy, creativity, confidence, connections and inspiration that festivals can make possible.
In 2019 we are stepping outside onto the High Street and hoping — as part of a collective — to spread more of this type of magic. As part of our thinking and designing for Do Fest 2019 a group of lovely doers, makers, and creatives joined in for a bit of festival #detectorism.
This session was part of our gather & create series of gatherings where we came together over delicious food to connect, share ideas and together build experiences for a kinder and more creative Dudley High Street.
In case you haven’t taken part before, #detectorism is our way of learning together, out in the open. We do this by paying attention to the patterns in what we witness, feel, experience, say and do as a community. We think about how those patterns relate to the spaces we shape and inhabit, and the wider systems that we interact with. So the purpose of our festival detectorism was to help us to be really intentional in using our collective wisdom to co-design our Summer festival and the Spring festivities that lead up to it.
as part of this shared learning we wanted to dig into:
•What do we think about when we think about festivals?
•Why do we go to them?
•What have we experienced and connected with at festivals?
•What signals do they emit to the world about our culture and traditions? •Knowing all this what might we design into our festival and festivities on Dudley High Street?
Our group of eager detectorists talked about the different types of festivals we could think of — reaching back into our memories of childhood festivals, thinking about those that are familiar to us and those that aren’t, both big and little, close by and far away.
This in itself was so illuminating — for some of us our first thought was festivals are about popular culture (music, poetry, literature, film); for others festivals are often rooted in faith (like Diwali, or Harvest festival); while for some there was a really strong part of their memories attached to place based festivals in the local town where they grew up. We also spoke about the cultural potency of identity based festivals (like Pride and Notting Hill Carnival) and seasonal festivals that feed local traditions and mark the passage of time (like May Day).
the patterns and signals of festival imaginaries
With all these different types of festivals on the table we began to dig into our different collective festival experiences and memories. Here we paid attention to the purpose of those festival: how they touch people’s lives in different ways, why people take part, and what drives people to convene them.
We saw patterns around suspending usual behaviours and social norms — a feeling of being on holiday, feelings of freedom, liberty from the usual ways in which we feel compelled to behave. The noise, the smells, the pace, the crowds of strangers you smile at, the exciting new experiences you pay attention to, the anticipation of going with all your family and friends.
We then explored together how these collective experiences, and even the very presence of these festivals, weave into and inform our cultures. What signals do they emit and why those matter in the design of our own festival here on Dudley High Street?
Here the capacity for festivals to introduce us to new ideas, new people, new experiences, new stories and new perspectives was key. As was the pride, thought and investment of time and creativity that marks the preparation for festivals. A key signal is that we can see that there ARE people that care, that believe, and that have the courage to make things happen.
This temporary emergence from our usual closed behaviours & hyper-paced modern lives so we can spend time in the joyful building of shared collective memories was a really very powerful theme.
By repeating these events (like annual festivals) we create traditions, friendships, stories and memories. These help to weave a common purpose and identity into our social fabric, in the bonds that bind us to each other and to the places we care about.
When we occupy public space with our collective creativity it reveals a version of citizenship through a visibility that might usually feel unavailable to some.
We reflected upon how festivals act as an unpressured and open invitation to take part — even if that means observing with curiosity from afar. This informality creates moments and spaces of interaction amongst strangers that is often missing from our public spaces. It brings energy, light and creative intent to an area that might often feel grey, sad and lifeless.
intentional design for cultural emergence
Based on these reflections we all agreed we want to design in this sense of joy, playfulness and informality so those happy connections might happen more often on Dudley High Street.
By creating signals that give us permission to suspend our usual behaviours we are encouraged to pause, look up, and share space differently. In this way we are more likely to connect with new people, new ideas and new experiences.
For example, by designing in an openness to spaces like open gardens there is an unlocking of resources and inspiration as well as an expression of trust and welcome. We all talked about how much we love how our horizons are expanded in those magical festival moments and spaces. We definitely want and need more of that on our High Street.
Through the sprinkling of a variety of thoughtful creative spaces and happenings we signal we are rejecting what can feel like the identikit commercialised and privatised homogeneity of so many of our High Streets.
Imagine if our High Street was about more than being on our own whilst shopping, driving and parking. What if our High Street meant spending relaxed time with our children, grandparents, and neighbours laughing and chatting? What if it meant meeting new friends as we experience new foods, music, arts, poetry, stories, dance and lots of other creative stuff together?
What if our High Street was a place where as a collective we create joyful moments and memories to weave into the social traditions of our community that are built on and celebrated for generations to come? What if…?
We have used this shared learning to inform the ongoing design of Do Fest 2019 and to help us pay attention to the signals sent out from all projects, happenings and experiences.
Paying attention to signals by observing or listening in our detectorism we are contributing to an approach that values scaling deep (i.e. impacting cultural roots). You can read more about this expanded approach to scaling here.
