Rock Hackathon
Overview
In November 2018 the City of Skopje, the Faculty of Architecture and SkopjeLab, with Ecopreneurs for the Climate, held a hackathon in Skopje that invited students, young professionals and entrepreneurs to develop eco-business ideas that reuse cultural heritage to create green public spaces in the Old Bazaar. SmartUp facilitated, working through the SkopjeLab team.
The Skopje Rock Hackathon was the Skopje event of the international ROCK project on cultural heritage as a driver of urban regeneration (36 partners from 13 countries) and part of the Young Ecopreneurs Climathons 2018. It took place on 9-11 November 2018 at the National and University Library "St. Clement of Ohrid", and the call invited up to 10 teams (40 participants). The call promised the winning team a place in an incubation programme run by the co-organisers and a chance to present at a ROCK event in 2019.
The challenge
A heritage district that needs new uses
The Old Bazaar is the historic centre of Skopje, where the ROCK project was running activities.
Green space in a dense historic centre
The question was how existing heritage can be reused for green public spaces and eco-business models.
From ideas to eco-businesses
Participants were invited to turn ideas into eco-business models, supported by the Green Business Canvas, so the event had to move quickly from the challenge to concepts people could develop further.
Activities and methods
A co-creation marathon for students, young professionals, entrepreneurs and interested residents. SmartUp facilitated, working through the SkopjeLab team alongside the City, the Faculty of Architecture and ECO4CLIM.
- Co-creation & innovation processes. The programme planned about four working sessions over two and a half days, led by international expert facilitators and supported by the Green Business Canvas tool.
- Co-creation & innovation processes. Team formation on the day: people registered individually or as teams and were grouped at the start.
- Research, insight & strategy. An information session was scheduled for 31 October 2018 at the Faculty of Architecture to introduce the challenge and the Old Bazaar setting, with applications closing on 7 November.
- Pilots, implementation & scaling. A planned route after the event: incubation for the winning team and a chance to present at a ROCK event in 2019.
Impact and learning
A Skopje event within an international programme. The hackathon connected Skopje's Old Bazaar to the international ROCK project on cultural heritage and urban regeneration and to the Young Ecopreneurs Climathons 2018, and gave students, young professionals and entrepreneurs a structured way to propose green uses for heritage spaces.
Link to the public space work. The hackathon took place in the same months as the field research for Redesign of public spaces, Edition 1 and shares its theme of green public space. The Edition 2 workshops in December 2019 were also held in the Old Bazaar.
Gallery
Outputs
Related Projects
City of Skopje Innovation Center – SkopjeLab (North Macedonia)
SkopjeLab, the City of Skopje Innovation Center, was the first public sector innovation centre founded within a public institution in the Balkans. Managed by SmartUp from July 2017 to February 2022, it brought city staff, citizens and partners together to redesign city services, open city data, co-design public spaces and build innovation skills in the administration.
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Redesign of public spaces, Edition 1
In 2018 SmartUp, through SkopjeLab, asked Skopje residents which neglected green spaces needed attention, then studied each site through interviews, observation and an online questionnaire. The research led to concept designs, and seven of them went to a City tender for execution designs in October 2019. Five green squares were built in 2020-2021.
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Redesign of public spaces, Edition 2
From December 2019 to February 2020, SmartUp designed and facilitated, through SkopjeLab, a two-round co-creation process in which 35 participants, guided by eight mentors, co-designed small public spaces in Skopje. Mentors and participants were recruited by public call, every team began with fieldwork, and the process produced nine detailed concept designs.
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Planning similar work?
SmartUp can support research, co-creation, facilitation, digital tools, implementation, or learning documentation for related programmes.