Creative Placemaking

LISC defines creative placemaking as a collaborative process that leverages the unique power of arts and culture to empower people to build vibrant, resilient, and socially connected communities in the places they call home.

We bring together artists, arts organizations, and community organizations in collaboration to activate spaces, revitalize places, and preserve neighborhood identity and culture. Creative placemaking is a tool for community development that helps achieve the following:

Social Impact: Creative placemaking brings together people of diverse backgrounds. They can inspire residents to transform a neighborhood in ways that reflect their own sense of beauty, history and identity.
Physical Impact: Creative placemaking transforms the physical environment in ways that make it distinctive, recognizable as home to a unique mix of cultures. Renovating, repopulating, sprucing up, and embellishing spaces can nurture new connections and spur investment.
Economic Impact: Creative placemaking supports the livelihood of local artists as cultural innovators and entrepreneurs. It fosters the development of arts-related business clusters. Once enhanced with art and bustling with activity, a neighborhood draws more commerce and foot traffic, which in turn stimulate investment and creates jobs.

We work with local community groups to integrate the arts and culture into their revitalization activities.

Convenes Arts & Culture Committees to encourage strategic collaboration among artists and community organizations in our Sustainable Communities neighborhoods of West Philadelphia and Eastern North Philadelphia
Invests in creative placemaking projects through loans, grants, equity investments and technical assistance.
Measures and documents community outcomes to assess the impact of cultural and arts-based programs.