Title: Face Your World: Co-creation in Urban Design

Source: Ownership in the Hybrid City, Virtueel Platform (2012)

Fragment: Face Your World is a long-term project by the artist Jeanne van Heeswijk in collaboration with architect Dennis Kaspori. It involves young people and members of the local community taking on the role of urban designer by participating in an artwork that brings together town planning, computer technology and creative linking. The first phase of the project started in 2002 in the U.S. town of Columbus, Ohio, where children from deprived neighbourhoods were taken on a bus tour of various downtown districts. Using computers and digital cameras, they were able to upload their own material to a 3D computer environment called the Interactor. Here, they could work together with other users and negotiate about the design of their own living environment. The results were displayed on screens in the public space – at bus stops. The second version of the project took place in Amsterdam (2005) and a third in Rotterdam (2006).