I have just skim read Mayors’ Institute on City Design’s (MICD) most recent publication, Creative Placemaking(pdf)by Dr. Ann Markusen, principal of Markusen Economic Research Services, and Anne Gadwa, principal with Metris Arts Consulting focuses on how communities are using the arts and other creative assets to help shape their physical, social, and economic character.

From the parts of the 69-page Creative Placemaking(pdf) document that I have read it has great content that gives data about the industry including number of artists, contribution to USA GDP, industry exports,  and cases studies. The report also looks into partnerships, regulatory hurdles, avoiding displacement & gentrification and developing metrics for evaluation.

The report points to key elements for a project’s success – Initiators, Distinctiveness, Mobilizing Public, Private Sector Support, Arts Community and Partnerships.

Creative Placemaking(pdf) provides 14 case studies from across the USA and a summary of each project.

Creative Placemaking(pdf)is a resource for mayors, arts organizations, the philanthropic sector, and others interested in understanding strategies for leveraging the arts to help shape and revitalize the physical, social, and economic character of neighborhoods, cities, and towns. If your artist, designer, landscape architect, architect or a city employee this document is a must read.

I’ll think this great quote from the report  sums up the quality of  Creative Placemaking(pdf)

A culture-based revitalization effort must be appropriate to its local circumstances, not a “me, too” replica of what other cities and towns are doing. The best of the projects nurture distinctive qualities and resources that already exist in the community and can be celebrated to serve community members while drawing in visitors and new businesses, as Mark Stern and Susan Seifert’s longitudinal study in Philadelphia finds.

Download the report at National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) – warning direct link to PDF (right click save as)

Other resources on NEA’s website along with other arts and community design resources:

• Examples of creative placemaking projects through the MICD25 funding program. MICD25 grants were awarded in July 2010 to 22 organizations that used the arts in innovative ways to improve their neighborhoods.
• Research reports such as Live from Your Neighborhood: A National Study of Outdoor Arts Festivals(pdf) and The Arts and Civic Engagement(pdf).
• An archived webcast of a panel on creative placemaking featuring Dr. Markusen and author Richard Florida among others.
• Videos about community design with NEA Design Director Jason Schupach