After one month of the inaugural session of the Youth Ambassador program, our placemaking duties bring us together again on a cold Saturday in late January.
As the team of ambassadors enlarged in the meantime, on this occasion we introduced a new member, Margarita from Ukraine.
The goal of this meeting was to further concretize working topics to develop in the incoming months and create working groups. To guide this process, one of our mentors, Gall Podlaszewski -a professional in architecture and placemaking- gave a presentation about the 3 dimensions of placemaking: spatial, social, and organizational. Later he made ambassadors reflect on their points of reference, visions, and plans about the places they would like to work with.
After sparking an interesting brainstorming session where several places in Erfurt and Weimar were considered we decided on the next steps: going on a city expedition to explore those places and their histories, stories, current challenges, and potentialities for the future. As a result, 3 city expeditions will be done in Erfurt, Weimar, and Altenburg in the incoming weeks. After comparison and analysis of the places, we will start working on the spots with the help of placemaking methods and tools.
As the snowstorm ceased, the evening closed with some informal conversations about our multicultural perspectives of Erfurt and Weimar public spaces. Hopefully, in the next encounters, we will actively engage in the placemaking of those spaces.
