We are half-way through the U.R{BNE} Festival for 2013! It’s been a fantastic few weeks, and we’re looking forward to the next few! Amy Saunders Grey, Vibrant Places founder, is on the Leadership Panel for the Collective. Along with her fellow leaders, Amy has assisted members in establishing their events (most of whom have never done anything like this before), working with council to get permits and producing the upcoming City Chic event. Events this week are Spencer Lane Live on Wednesday 24th, Games Night on ANZAC day (which will be at Reddacliff Place), the Bleeding Heart Space Exhibit Opening Night and a Bridges Walk on the 28th. But there are still more events coming up after this week! Plus looking back there have been some fantastic events during the Festival and below are some highlight images.
URBNE / Ideas Fiesta Albert St Picnic (photo by Jessie)
Crowds and decor of Arabian Nights in Spencer Lane
Art @ the Park
Lazy Sunday Cycle
The crowd at Scavenger Snaps
Winners of Scavenger Snaps (click to enlarge)
URBNE Film Festival organised by Yen (and Amy was part of the panel)
For the last 4 years I have been fortunate to have a job as a Project Landscape Architect at Yurrah; I have been working full time at Yurrah and doing Vibrant Places work in my spare time. By day I'm a Landscape Architect, by night ... Yurrah are an Environmental Consultancy and it's been great to get a Land Planning perspective on Landscape Architecture. I'll never forget it and I'm sure it will influence my future work. But now I'm moving on and I'm very excited to announce I will be working at the new firm Meter Design. Meter will allow me to use the skills I've obtained doing my Vibrant Places work. Their focus is on Urban Design and Masterplanning at a conceptual level. Even more exciting I'll be working flexible hours, casually, meaning I can balance my Vibrant Places work with my Landscape Architectural work. And there are some really exciting things I am working on right now including Burnett City Chic ... and the soon to be announced Seaside Dinner (more to come on that). Games Night will still be on for 2013 and we have some great Special Event ideas happening soon. Lazy Sunday Cycle has expanded to Sydney and we are getting such large numbers that we are considering seeking sponsorship. We're starting to organise Brisbane Diner en Blanc 2013 and have some great ideas to watch out for. I'll be traveling to London in September for the London Design Festival with the bursary I received for my Queensland Emerging Leader Award and will be blogging the whole time I'm there. Thankyou for following me and I look forward to contributing more in the future. -Amy
I am so amazed at the incredible work of Kelly Meyer, Graphic Designer, as she paints the Giant Mahjong! To my knowledge this is the largest Mahjong set in the world (but if you know of a larger one, let me know). The Giant Mahjong will activate King George Square for free, on 21 February 2013 (1 weeks time) from 5-9pm, as part of the Brisbane City Council's BrisAsia Festival - it will be well worth coming to check out this incredible work by Kelly!
Kelly Meyer paints a Giant Mahjong tile
A flurry of colourful parasols greet you on your way home. Everyone around you fans themselves on the warm summer night standing under glowing, floating lanterns. You hear loud, rhythmic drums and are enticed to join the growing crowd. They stop. The crowd parts, and a Giant Mahjong set is revealed. People call out they are looking for players for the normal sized Mahjong games, and you decide to join them later. You smell delicious food sizzling on a hotplate, incredibly installed on a bike. You’re intrigued and can’t help but go and grab some gyoza. Boiling hot tea is being poured ceremoniously into china, and you watch and learn, so you can try it later at home. Around you are more Giant Games – Giant Chinese Checkers, Giant Scrabble, Giant Jenga, Giant Connect Four. People of all ages, cultures and background are playing the games and enjoying themselves. Where are you? You’re in Brisbane’s King George Square on 21 February 2013 at 5pm for BrisAsia Games! If you want this experience come along to the BrisAsia Games Night for: EDIT: Date corrected to Thursday night 21 February 2013
This has been the biggest year of my life, professionally and personally and I’m so grateful that you were all there on the journey with me. My year started with buying our first house, an engagement, creating the first Human Chess as part of Games Night (which I must promote that we are doing again tomorrow night - check out the FB event) and being awarded a Lord Mayor Australia Day’s Award for Games Night … … towards the middle of the year I was part of the team leading the UR{BNE} Festival and started the Ideas Café; an idea I came up with as part of the Queensland Youth Forum was developed by a fantastic team and I joined them for Walk in Our Shoes; I was awarded a Queensland Emerging Designer Award; published a book about the five years of Brisbane PARK(ing) Day; co-founded Giant Games as a business with my father; I was given the amazing opportunity to promote Brisbane and the activation of public space work that I do at the BMW Guggenheim Lab in Berlin; Lazy Sunday Cycle just kept getting bigger and better each month; and I co-founded and co-directed the first ever Diner en Blanc in Australia … … and just recently I married a lovely man and we shared a fantastic honeymoon trip to northern Vietnam and northern Thailand, where I was thoroughly inspired by the people and the landscapes (… so watch this space)! I’m really looking forward to 2013 and I hope we can continue to fulfill our aims of making Brisbane a more vibrant city.
My husband and I training elephants in Thailand at the Elephant Conservation Centre, Chiang Mai
The inaugural Brisbane Diner en Blanc, which was the first event like it in Australia, was a huge success! The video above by Blueroom Productions captured the charming moments, conversations between strangers and friends, the elegant dresses, the chivalrous men, romantic glances, panoramic views, time-lapse shots, entertainment, gourmet food, bubbles, balloons, sparklers, smiles … all with the backdrop of our gorgeous CBD skyline and our treasured Brisbane River from (our formerly secret location) South Bank! The concept for this event was discovered while organising Brisbane’s UR{BNE} Festival 2012, which celebrates our city by encouraging community and cultural activity in public spaces. Originally only a few hundred guests were anticipated at this year’s event, but we quickly increased this to 1,000 when interest seemed to peak. In the final weeks the waiting list increased to 6,800 blowing away all our expectations! We are so amazed by the enthusiasm and interest shown by thousands of Brisbane-ites and Brissy visitors. The event would not have happened and would not have been as magical without the input of all of the guests. As I wrote previously about this event, without the attendees’ full commitment, the event would not have the same impact and I am proud that no one broke the rules, no one was turned away and the night was much richer because of everyone’s effort. Reflecting on everyone’s effort I believe everyone had a good time, because they put the effort in. Sometimes if we get given everything we tend to mistreat things. Instead everyone was courteous and no one drank too much (but just enough to have a fun time), no one was rude and everyone had a huge smile on their faces. We had a huge response to this year’s event and next year we hope to have an even bigger event, but we can’t do it without your help! We need volunteers for next year! With the huge interest in the inaugural event, we want to make the 2013 event much bigger to accommodate as many people as possible. We can’t however accommodate everyone without volunteers. We need at least 1 volunteer per 50 people! This year we had 23 volunteers for 1000 people so to make this bigger we need your help. Our attendee numbers will depend on the location we can book in and the number of volunteers. All our volunteers this year had a lot of fun and found the process rewarding and exciting. If you are an Events Manager, have an interest in events, want a backstage look at Diner en Blanc or just want to contribute to your city, please contact us at brisbane@dinerenblanc.info
Yesterday, I hired a bike and as I rode through the foreign streets of Berlin my jet lag washed away. I felt free and felt connected to something I enjoy doing at home. I tore through the streets of Berlin trying to experience as much of it as possible in the few hours of free time I had been given. I am actually proud to say that I was stopped by quite a few tourists who asked me for directions (in many languages!), thinking I was a local. I was amazed by the shared nature of the streets in Berlin, and felt quite safe, without a helmet riding on the road, sometimes on dedicated paths, sometimes on cycle streets, sometimes on very busy roads right next to cars. The cars know how to drive around cyclists and the shared zones were easy to navigate! It made me feel safe. I reflected on this particularly while listening to the talk by Ben Hamilton-Baillie, who discussed shared traffic spaces at the Lab, last night. He discussed many exemplary projects where the street was changed so that the street dynamics were altered to complement the pedestrians and encourage “intelligent driving”. It's called Shared Spaces and encourages placemaking principals to be used when designing streets. He discussed the removal of speed signs and encouraging ambiguity, rather than strict rules upon drivers. This ultimately slows them down. He showed numerous examples of how this has worked; how these projects have made drivers feel uncomfortable to drive fast. Hamilton-Baillie discussed that we should trust the intelligence of drivers, something we aren't likely to do easily. I thought it was interesting that he discussed that highways were still essential for car movement, but in a 2km radius to community and local shop infrastructure, we should consider shared spaces. My favourite story was about the Ring Road removal in Kent. Hamilton-Baillie's team re-designed the road to focus on pedestrian movement to the buildings, not for the cars. Jeremy Clarkson was quoted as saying “millions would die” from this change. So, in a few years, there has been only one bruised knee. The statement by Clarkson received a lot of press; the fact that years on no one has been killed, hasn't made the news.
East Berlin Wall Gallery - as seen from my bike
A PARK in a carpark to promote a book celebrating creating PARKs in carparks!
Last Sunday was the launch of the Brisbane PARK(ing) Day Book, celebrating 5 years of PARK(ing) Day in Brisbane and it's influences on our city. The launch was part of the UR{BNE} Festival in May. The First edition of the book sold out at the event, but you can buy the second edition online at Blurb. The launch was a great experience for co-organiser Yen, to actually create a PARK for the first time. We created the PARK at the location of the first one in Brisbane, outside Urban Grind in Paddington. The PARK was simple just some artificial turf (kindly loaned from RPS), some stools and traffic cones. After setting it we instantly had some Urban Grind customers sitting on the grass, in the shade, drinking their coffee. You could see what a difference having space like this in front of the cafe would bring. Rather than the cafe being covered up by parked cars (which may only cater to the convenience of 1 person for the whole day) it became an extension to the cafe and drew in more life from the street. This sort of installation creates a more vibrant, human-scale of street life and also brings in more business for the cafe.
About 1 hour into the park the Council/RACQ traffic response unit stopped by. They had received a complaint! The officers were very nice and politely asked if we could move the turf in by a foot and keep our traffic cones where they were, but only if we didn't mind. Of course we obliged to such a polite and easy request. It barely impacted our PARK at all! I also offered to give the officers my number in case someone called again, but no one did. It's like this even on PARK(ing) Day - generally there is no trouble and if you are requested to do something, then you do.
Of course this PARK was just to promote PARK(ing) Day and the book. The real PARK(ing) Day will be on 21 September this year and we invite Brisbane, once again to join in and change parking in our city.
We must thank and acknowledge Rebar Arts Collective from San Francisco who came up with the concept of PARK(ing) Day and continue to support it with their great international website - http://parkingday.org/
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Diner en Blanc is a magical, elegant picnic in a public space. It is a spectacle event focused on Parisian values of sophistication, decorum, etiquette and good taste.
The popular international event Diner en Blanc comes to Australia in 2012. Yen, Brooke and myself (the UR{BNE} Festival founders) have been fortunate enough to be selected to host the inaugural event in Brisbane. We were interested in hosting the event because it will contribute to creating Vibrant Places in Brisbane.
Because this is the first year in Brisbane, I wanted to write a comprehensive guide of: - the history of Diner en Blanc
- how you can you be invited to the event
- how you can volunteer
- what the night will be like
- what you need to bring and why
- when and where
- what to wear
- other international events
After reading this guide if you still have any questions comment on this post or email brisbane@dinerenblanc.info The history of Diner en Blanc
In 1988 François Pasquier returned to Paris and organised a reunion with friends. So many friends wanted to come that he decided to hold the dinner party in a public space. To identify his guests he asked them to dress in white. Each guest was asked to bring one extra friend. They bought their own tables, chairs, decorations and food … and so started the tradition of Diner en Blanc!
The first yearly events in Paris, happened guerilla style and so the location of the events were revealed last minute, to evade the authorities. In more recent events Diner en Blanc has attracted over 12,000 diners (selected from over 30,000 hopefuls). To keep the tradition of the event diners are still not told about where the location is until the last minute, which means passers-by are surprised by the unfolding magical scene. The attendees still also wear white, bring their own tables, chairs, decorations and food, the hosts friends are invited first and everyone conducts themselves elegantly and with the greatest decorum.
How you can be invited to the event
You can register your interest online. It's first in best dressed, so make sure you register as soon as possible. Numbers are limited.
If you are lucky enough to be selected you will receive an invite about 1 month before the event.
The tradition of Diner en Blanc is that Diner en Blanc members first choose close friends to invite, those friends then recommend friends who are invited, and then new guests, who have registered are invited.
How you can volunteer
Diner en Blanc needs volunteers. If you are interested you can contact us at: brisbane@dinerenblanc.info What the night will be like
You will arrive at your assigned Transportation Location one hour before the event. These Transportation Locations will be central Brisbane points that will be places to easy park or catch public transport to.
This is the time when your volunteer will direct you to a bus, train, ferry or will walk with you to the Diner en Blanc destination. Until this point the location will be a secret! Imagine how amazing it will be to see passers-by's faces as they see 1000s of people all in white, pop out of nowhere and have an elegant picnic!
Your volunteer will show you where to set up your table. Everyone will arrive and the dinner will begin. Then there will be music, wine, laughing, dancing and merriment!
What you will need to bring and why
You will bring your table (which will be a square shape between 60-75cm), white chairs, food and decorations.
This may seem cumbersome, but by each guest bringing these items means that the event is a complete secret until it is all set up. The event will just pop-up as the guests arrive, there will be no evidence of the location until everyone arrives.
We will make it as easy as possible to bring your items. Walking distances will be short and the transportation will cater for the items you will be bringing.
When and where
The date will be confirmed very soon. We will announce it here with an update, on our facebook and website.
And for the location, it's a secret that will be revealed last minute!
What to wear
White, white, white … very elegant! Originality is welcome. Have fun and get all dressed up! Have a look at our Pinterest for ideas.
No T-shirts, coloured shoes, sports shoes, baseball caps or shorts.
Brisbane, I think you've forgot about an important aspect of cycling ... cycling for fun!
Cycling is not JUST about going fast, it's not just about having a fashionable bike, it's not just about getting from A to B as fast as possible, or just about wearing tight lycra; it can be about having the wind in your hair, it can be about freedom, it can be about being social, it can be about being kind and considerate to other people using the road or pathway. So Brisbane, cycle with a smile and ride a little bit lazier.Rachel Smith and I started Lazy Sunday Cycle t o encourage a little more of this type of cycling in Brisbane.
Today was our 10th Lazy Sunday Cycle ride and we decided to highlight 2 of our favourite green spaces in Brisbane - Roma Street Parklands and the Northey Street City Farm. We called it Ride from Inner City Park to Inner Suburbs Farm!We had a great turn out of 45 rides, of different skills and different ages. We stopped at the Northey Street City Farm Sunday Organic Markets and had lovely picnic where everyone was able to socialise and chat. A highlight for me, was when everyone patiently waited 10 minutes for a young rider, who fell off his bike, to compose himself. It goes to show that Lazy Sunday Cycle is really a positive, social, community ride. Cyclists can be kind, courteous and relaxed - which is certainly not the stereotype in Brisbane.
The young boy is fine and was pretty happy to get a ride in the cargo bike. Thankyou to his parents who understand that bumps and bruises are a part of a child's life.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Join us for our next ride on 3 June starting at Southbank.
And also come in your best formal-wear to this fun "Style over Speed" ride on 25 May as part of the UR{BNE} Festival 2012.
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