It’s more than acknowledged that culture is the rocket fuel of regeneration. When people think about place making, they imagine participation in fun activities that happen in beautiful public spaces surrounded by nature and artwork. Music venues give places an identity and people sit outside eating and drinking in the sun. CGI’s communicating master plans or selling investment strategies display these idyllic takes. All of it underwritten by the value arts and culture bring to the equation.
Sometimes though, the very success that builds these dreams creates victims of the dreamers. Pioneer venues are forced out through higher rents and/or greed, noise complaints close much loved venues, and in swoop chains… or worse, vape shops.
In 2028 one place in the UK will be crowned the first ever Town of Culture. Like its sister across the river, Birkenhead sees an opportunity to pump prime regeneration with cultural golden thread. To build on the success of Liverpool’s 2008 European Capital of Culture and apply it twenty years later in a place that looks and feels pretty much like every post industrial town. So If it can be done here, can others learn from it and apply it?
At FLIPIM ‘26, in the midst of developing the Birkenheads Town of Culture bid, FLIPIM will explore how critical the role of arts and culture is to delivering the regeneration of places that deliver pride, bring people together in divisive times, and ultimately change a place, for the better, forever.
Together we’ll reflect and discuss the successes and shortcomings of using culture through programmes like the Town of Culture and City of Culture to deliver inclusive and community-led regeneration with the aforementioned rocket fuel.
Join the conversation at FLIPIM on Thursday 24th September 2026, register here.
