Projects

Our focus, in partnership with European institutions and organisations, is on citizen-driven cultural development of urban and rural areas. As urban practitioners, researchers and educators, we explore the role of cultural innovations, arts and non-formal education in fostering the local communities, revitalizing neglected places and contributing to the societal resilience.

Woodish – stories of the wooden houses and circular skills (NCM)

Project title: Stories of the Wooden Houses: Circular Skills and Lifestyle Narratives of the Historical Housing Inhabitants in Nordic and Baltic Countries Project site: under construction Project locations: – Itätulli wooden quarte at city of Pori, Satakunta region, Finland; – wooden houses in the city Trondheim, Trøndelag country, Norway; – historical part of Šnipiškės district,…

Rural Cultural Planning (CBSS)

Project title: Rural Cultural Planning (project site); Description and goal: Smaller towns and rural communities offer many advantages which cities lack, such as easy access to nature, local traditions and skills, place-based food systems, etc. However, to take full advantage of the rebalancing between the urban and the rural, smaller rural communities need to activate…

Urban Cultural Planning – citizen-centred social innovation (Interreg BSR)

Project title: Cultural Planning as a proven method of citizen-centred social innovation (Urban Cultural Planning). Partners: Danish Cultural Institute (Leader), City of Pori, City of Riga, Guldborgsund municipality, Pomorskie Voivodeship, City Culture Institute, Heinrich Böll Foundation Schleswig-Holstein, Project company Kiel-Gaarden GmbH, The Baltic Sea Cultural Center, Copenhagen International Theater, University of Skövde, Inland Norway University…

River-oriented education in waterfront communities (Erasmus+)

I_Improve (Innovative, Informal Methodologies for Practical, River-Oriented and Versatile Education) is a cooperative European project co-funded by Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

Culturability: Exploring Visaginas City Identity – participatory approach (NCM)

Project title: Visaginas: Participatory Approaches Toward Developing the Identity of the City Partners: Danish Cultural Institute (Leader), City of Pori, Culturability network, Laboratory for Urban Games and Research Laimikis.lt Every consortium partner explored the local cultural resources and the existing networks of cultural actors in the chosen areas. Based on materials collected during participatory research,…

Co-design workshops: open code urban furniture (ECF)

Title: Open code urban furniture, co-design workshop This initiative is part of a bigger networking project, “Public Space Makers”. Grantee of ECF Design & Research Grant: Jekaterina Lavrinec (Laimikis.lt). Associated partners: Noel Hatch (European Alternatives, UK), Paco Gonzalez (RadarQ, Spain). During the project, co-design workshops are run in London, Barcelona, and Vilnius in cooperation with the…

Citizen participation in urban governance (CBSS)

Project title: Citizen Participation in Urban Governance Partners: Minsk Urban Platform (leader), Laboratory for Urban Games and Research “Laimikis.lt”. Audiences of the project: urban activists, practitioners, and experts working in participatory planning in Belarus and the Baltic Sea Region. Inhabitants of the districts of multistore houses in Minsk. Users of the public spaces in Vilnius.…

InsideViews – Fieldwork Methods of Social Anthropology (Grundtvig)

Title of the project:  InsideViews – Fieldwork Methods of Social Anthropology to Promote Civic, Cultural and Intercultural Education Funded by: Grundtvig; Years: 2o13-2o15 The project gathers professionals of non-formal education, social anthropologists, society museum curators, artists, social workers, and civic and intercultural professionals who are looking for new pedagogical tools aiming at valorising cultural diversity,…

Intercontexts – Civic and Cultural Education in disadvantaged local contexts (Grundtvig)

Title of the project: InterContext – Contributions of Civic and Cultural Education in Disadvantaged Local Contexts; Partners: Zeitpfeil e.V. in cooperation with the experts of the regional Community Management Program (Germany, leader); Metropop! (France); ICE (Portugal), Intergracijas Centrs (Latvia); Urban games and research Lab “Laimikis.lt” (Lithuania). Funded by: Grundtvig; Duration: 2011-2013 About the project The…

Some events:

• 2o18, March 22-24, Espoo/Helsinki: Nordic Urban Laboratory. Jekaterina runs a workshop in urban games.

• 2o18, Feb 15 – Riga, Culturability meeting on Cultural Planning (Poland-Germany-Denmark-Finland-Lithuania-Latvia-Norway).

• 2o18, Jan 28 – Feb 3 – London, Manchester, Belfast: UK study tour “Arts and social inclusion”, British Council.

• 2o17, Dec – Jekaterina Lavrinec was awarded the Vilnius Bee sign for the works for Vilnius and its communities. Public award.

• 2o17, Dec 8-17 – Shenzhen (China), Bi-city Biennale for Urbanism and Architecture. Laimikis.lt presents an exhibition “Urban patchwork”, devoted to the wooden Šnipiškės.

• 2o17, Dec – Riga, Culturability meeting on Cultural Planning (Poland-Germany-Denmark-Finland-Lithuania-Latvia-Norway)

• 2o17, Sept 17 – School of Citizen Artist at Šančiai Library, Kaunas;

• 2o17, July 5 – 13 / August 29 – September 2: Urbingo game for Liverpool. Hosted by Engage Liverpool;

• 2o17, June : Culturability: cultural planning & games seminar;

• 2o17, June 8-9: Reaktor: cultural planning workshop, Visaginas;

• 2o17, May 25-28: TEH83: Sharing Communities, ROJC, Pula, Croatia;

• 2o17, May 20-21: Coordinate System, the Urban Art Platform of Eastern Europe, Forum, Berlin;

• 2o17, May 17-20: Baltic Audience Links – “Urban Participation” Seminar & Workshop, hosted by the Baltic Sea Cultural Center, Gdansk;

• 2o17, April 7-8: Co-urbanism, hosted by Laimikis.lt, Vilnius;

• 2o17, March 8-11: CitizensLab meeting in Brussels;

• 2o17, March 1-3: Culturability working group on Cultural planning at Pori, Finland.

• 2o17, Feb 21-23: Conference Audience Links Xchange. J. Lavrinec as a key speaker: presenting the research on Baltic Audience Links. The moderator of the Baltic NGOs session.

• 2o17, Jan 17-22: Urbingo workshop for Cartierul Creativ Carolina, Alba Iulia, Romania (CitizensLab).

• 2o16, Oct 26: Forum “Culture and Sustainable Development”, paper: Creativity and social innovation for community development (Jekaterina Lavrinec).

• 2o16, Sept 24-27: Spatial Development Forum, Xtreme Urbanism. St. Petersburg, Russia. Crash-course in DIY urban culture and pannel for the Baltic DIY culture, dr. J. Lavrinec (Laimikis.lt) is one of the key speakers.

• 2o16, June 23-26: Citizens Lab: 12 European cities, 36 neighborhoods. MitOst e.V., Berlin.

• 2o16, June 16-17: Policy Area Culture, Warsaw

• 2o16, June 10-11: Baltic Sea NGO Forum, Gdansk. Key speaker for the topic “Meaning of the culture for the cooperative urban development”.

• 2o16, May 27-30: City Makers Summit, Amsterdam. Laimikis.lt is a City Embassy for Vilnius:)

• 2o16, April: Culturability meeting, hosted by Ars Baltica, Rendsburg‬.

• 2o16, March 30: “Vietos kultūra“. Pranešimas: Bendruomeninės kūrybinės iniciatyvos kaip vietovės gaivinimo įrankis. Utena.

• 2o16, March 18: UNESCO: Kultūrų raiškos įvairovė – darnesnės visuomenės link | Diversity of Cultural Expressions, speaker. Vilnius.Convention | Press.

• 2o16, Feb 4-5: City Makers Pre-summit, at De Zwijger, Amsterdam: video.
• 2o15, Sept: Interdisciplinary exhibition “City close to the water”. Object “Komoda nr 3”. The Baltic House Lab exhibition. Gdansk, Poland.

• 2o14, Nov 23-25: the Baltic networks meeting: the Baltic House program. Gdansk, Poland.

• 2o14, Nov 7-8: InsideViews meeting (Life Long Learning Programme) in Liege, Belgium.

• 2o14, Nov 2-3: Caucasus Cultural Initiatives Network’s event and conference “Community Art as an Impulse for Intercultural Dialog”, Speaker. Tbilisi, Georgia.

• 2o14, Oct 28-29: Baltic urbanists network meeting at Riga (@Goethe-Institut Riga & Urban Institute Riga). Participantion in the round table.

• 2o14, Oct 27: Public discussion “Vilnius: a Public Space?” with the architect R. Palekas, urban anthropologist J. Lavrinec, and Vilnius mayor A. Zuokas at “Inconvenient Films Festival” (Nepatogus kinas), Vilnius.

• 2o14, Oct 23-25: Idea Camp 2014, European Cultural Foundation, Marseille.

• 2o14, Sept 10-15: Contemporary art festival “Survival Kit”, Riga. Urban furniture workshop by Jekaterina Lavrinec at Liksnas 26, symposium “Urban Utopia: Art and Culture as a Tool for Exploring and Researching a City” (Latvian Center for Contemporary Art | Urban Institute, Riga) & round table on the Otherness (Fargfabriken).

• 2o14, July 25-27: Summer school “Creative and social practices in public space”, St.Petersburg. Tutorship.

• 2o14, June 20-21: Hosting an international Grundtvig partnership seminar-workshop “Participatory and Arts-based Research Approaches: the engaging tactics of collecting and communicating ethnographic data”, Vilnius.

• 2o14, June 13-20: Public lecture & training session for the participants of the Kaukas summer school “Reanimation of public space”, Kaunas.

• 2o14, April 17-18: A training session and consultancy for regional active citizens groups, NVO’s, municipality and elder workers “Regeneration of public spaces: urban design principles and cases”, Utena district. LT: Viešųjų erdvių tvarkymo planavimas: dizaino principų taikymas ir geroji patirtis, Utenos raj., Utenos regiono vietos veiklos grupė.

• 2o14, Feb 21-March 8: Laimikis.lt takes part in running a winter school in Critical Mapping, curating workshops, which focus on the wooden Šnipiškės.

• 2o14, Jan 28-Feb 2: Visiting InsideViews partners in Paris. Host:

• 2o13 Nov 24-28: Visit to Fargfabriken, Stockholm. The Baltic meeting on art tactics, promoting citizen participation.

• 2o13 Nov 7-8: Presenters at “Social Entrepreneurship for Liveable Cities” Forum, Riga, Latvia

• Starting from Oct 27: Street blogging session by and in Coffee Inn at Pilies str., Vilnius

• 2o13 Oct 26: “Contemporary Diaries”: presentations on Street Blog and Cabinets of Curiosities (Cinema Book workshop)

• 2o13 Oct 2-4: Strategies of preserving the old and creating the new in the urban spaces: Cases of the Baltic region Countries (New Urban Topologies, the Center of Contemporary Art and Urbanism Fargfabriken & TOK), Saint Petersburg, Russia

• 2o13 May-October: Street Mosaic workshop, Guided tours, Developing alternative playground, Neighbours’ meetings in the wooden neighborhood of Šnipiškės.

• 2o13 June-August: public debates on the reconstruction of public spaces (Lukiškės sq.) in Vilnius and citizen participation on radio & in the press. Micro-protest action.

• 2o13, June 12: Colloquium Vilnense session V: Civil Society? Public Spaces of Memory: presentation “Building Community Spaces in Šnipiškės neighborhood”.

• 2o13, May 17-20: Inter-Context meeting in Riga. Laimikis team presented a work in progress in Šnipiškės neighborhood.

• 2o13, May 3-5: “Išeik į aikštę” (Come to the square!) festival at Cathedral sq., Vilnius.

• 2o13, April 24-28: Laimikis team visits their colleagues in Berlin and explores community gardens initiatives.

• 2o13, Jan 23 – Feb 2: Laimikis team visits their Portuguese colleagues (ICE), who develop a regional project, focused on the actualization of historical memory and cultural heritage. Castelo de Vide school, Instituto Politécnico de Portalegre, Ferreira do Alentejo municipality and several museums and galleries around the region are involved.