Introduction

Cultural and Creative Industries (CCIs) play an essential role in shaping Europe’s social, environmental, and economic transitions. Yet unlike technology or business sectors, CCIs have access to far fewer intermediaries (such as incubators, accelerators, or public innovation agencies) that help ideas grow into sustainable solutions. This gap limits their ability to contribute fully to local innovation ecosystems.

There is a need to reimagine how public innovation infrastructures are designed, governed, and connected to cultural and creative practices. This begins by collectively exploring new roles for existing public institutions, experimenting with alternative collaboration models, and envisioning infrastructures that meet the specific needs of culturally-driven innovation.

Developed as part of ekip’s ongoing Future Forward Hackathons programme, our method for translating emerging societal, technological, and environmental priorities into forward-looking opportunities for the CCIs, the following scenarios and blueprints invite participants to imagine how existing public infrastructures could play this role of intermediaries for CCIs.

Faced with the challenge of envisioning new public innovation infrastructures tailored to the needs of CCIs, scenarios and blueprints serve as tools to:

• Explore new innovation opportunities for CCIs.
• Identify the skills, capabilities, and resources needed to sustain innovation and public infrastructure.
• Sketch the contours of future public innovation systems: who provides them, how they function, and what services they offer.

How to use the scenarios and blueprints

Scenarios can act as templates to guide participants through the development of fictional but grounded narratives about new innovation infrastructures that could support the needs of local ecosystems. While the scenarios present an imaginary context, they are inspired by urgent challenges currently faced by cities and regions across Europe. Research carried out across ekip, including desk research, social media listening, and interviews were used as input for these challenges.

Scenarios are not predictions, Rather, they are a prompting tool for imagining alternative futures, identifying opportunities, and grounding speculative infrastructures in realistic and locally relevant contexts.

For three of the scenarios (presented below), blueprints for public innovation infrastructure concepts were developed. They are not intended as polished or implementation-ready proposals. Instead, they act as provocations and a way to stimulate imaginative thinking in the policy space. Each concept, envisioned within a context of a specific local scenario, presents the potentials of CCI-centered innovation infrastructures and considerations for their sustainability. 

SCENARIO 1: How can geographic peripheries create opportunities, build skills and support innovation capacities of CCIs?

Local context: •Small regional city in central Europe •Population – 90k •No university to carry an innovation agenda forward •Municipality making significant investments towards environmental sustainability •Local art schools produce a number of future professionals in design, music & performing arts	Local ambitions: •Retain creative talent •Become an example of sustainability-driven innovation for other peripheral cities •Get industrial organisations more invested in local issues •Local public organisations – library, museums, arts schools, regional broadcaster – are keen to play a bigger role in innovation activities
CCI characteristics: •Creative and cultural professionals get a strong educational foundation in school, but have little skill-building opportunities after graduation •After graduating, young creatives & cultural professionals move to bigger cities to seek opportunities CCI companies that choose to stay are not actively engaged in innovation activities and rarely collaborate with other sectors	CCI challenges & needs: •Need access to a local audiences open to engage with more experimental products •Need access to a community of peers and collaborators who share similar values •Lack of entry points to start engaging in innovation activities

Blueprint 01: The Neighbourhood House

What if our public innovation infrastructure is a neighbourhood house that facilitates encounters between CCIs, citizens and local business, inviting them to address shared local challenges while practising empathy, shared values and storytelling as key open innovation skills?

SCENARIO 2: How can a local regeneration strategy create innovation and skill building opportunities for CCIs?

Local context: •A city in Benelux •Historically famous for its mining industry •Regional capital with a population of 120k •Three larger cities in the country have more established and broadly recognised creative industries, each with its own specialisation, namely media, architecture and fashion •The library and concert hall have been reopened recently as a combined venue, following a 30 million Euro investment.

Local ambitions: •To market itself as an upcoming hub for creativity, with more room for experimentation compared to the more established ecosystems in the three larger cities. •Highlight its industrial heritage to also position itself as a year-round tourist destination.

CCI characteristics: •Artists and other creatives work independently, lacking professional networks or collaborative opportunities •The university of applied sciences has recently transformed its communication studies offering to incorporate more digital design courses, including a motion capture studio. As a result, there is a growing digital arts and media scene, but it lacks visibility and integration with the wider community.

CCI challenges & needs: •Creatives struggle to develop innovation projects that would attract funding •Need opportunities to get noticed and showcase their ideas to other sectors and potential funders •Need opportunities for networking, skill-sharing, and mentorship between emerging and established professionals •Lack of examples of CCI support local innovation

Blueprint 02: The Never-ending City Festival

What if our public innovation infrastructure is an ongoing, interdisciplinary arts festival designed to revitalise the city by connecting its rich industrial heritage and local storytelling to student-led work and community-driven innovation?

SCENARIO 3: How to co-create innovation infrastructures with diverse communities within cities and regions?

Local context: •Regional capital (200k inhabitants) in a densely populated area. •Well connected to other regions by public transport •Biggest policy topic – integration of a fast growing population of expats and refugees •The traditionally conservative local government prioritises road infrastructure investments over social programmes •The big art museum (the main tourist draw) is operating isolated from universities, schools and other public actors in the city

Local ambitions: •Invest in the cultural integration and entrepreneurship of refugee and expat community •Invest in physical public spaces, also to support safety for vulnerable groups •Building creative networks and connections •Engage local industry in innovation around local challenges

CCI characteristics: •Participatory design approaches and expertise working in bottom-up ways •Technology-driven creativity •International influences •Eagerness to engage in innovation activities that would also contribute to cultural integration

CCI challenges & needs: •Language and cultural barriers •Conservative policy focus •Lack of preexisting relationships with local organisations •Relying on project-based, freelance work that does not provide security

Blueprint 03: The Museum as Connector

What if our public innovation infrastructure is a programme of participatory design and futuring workshops and activities – designed by, through, and in a regional art museum – to connect communities and support equitable participation?

SCENARIO 4: How can different generations of CCIs professionals share and build skills together to foster a culture of life-long skill development and innovation?

Local context: •Small regional city in eastern Europe •Long history of crafts and creative practices •Ageing population in need of solutions that would ensure cultural participation and wellbeing •Traditional crafts losing relevance among youth	Local ambitions: •Municipality looking for a way to rebrand itself and attract new investments •Promoting the unique regional identity through craft and design innovation while exploring opportunities offered by digital technologies •Establishing an intergenerational learning community that contributes to the local economy
CCI characteristics:‘Traditional’ or ‘analogue’ creative practitioners and craft makers that are starting to retire. With them, knowledge and skills might be lostYoung creative professionals highly competent in digital skills, digital literacy, online communication	CCI challenges & needs: •Digital divide and clashing values between different generations of CCI professionals •Lack of entrepreneurial skills among CCI professionals •Male-dominated job market •Lack of flexibility in the job market limits the engagement of those with caregiving responsibilities or disabilities

Co-creating with the scenarios

To support the co-creation of future-forward concepts and policy interventions in a workshop setting, we recommend using creative and visual methods.

• The method we used to generate the blueprints (pictured above) involved creating lonely hearts ads or advice columns, to let participants personify their future initiatives. (To learn more about this format in a workshop setting, you can read our blog recap.)  
• Another method that could be used involves zine-making which offers a low-barrier, high-creativity way to explore ideas visually. It encourages experimentation and collective storytelling which is especially useful when envisioning unfamiliar futures.

The following template can support you in developing your own scenarios and co-creating new blueprints that reimagine public innovation infrastructures:

Local context:Think about location, population size, educational institutions, and municipal agendas.	Local ambitions:Think about the broader policy context and ambitions of your place. What role is envisioned for CCIs and how do they connect to other sectors?
CCI characteristics:Think about the general profile of creative and cultural professionals, such as what job opportunities they are looking for; and the level of innovation activities among CCI companies.	CCI challenges & needs:Think about what challenges CCIs are facing, such as in skills development and job opportunities, and the opportunities for public infrastructure to play a supportive role.