Cities are where most of the planet’s population now live, and they offer the best opportunity to effect practical change at scale, and in a context to which people can relate. Cities are at the heart of addressing the social and environmental challenges of the 21st century. The Fab City is a global project to develop locally productive, self-sufficient and globally connected cities; it comprises an international think tank of civic leaders, fab lab champions, makers, urbanists and innovators working on changing paradigm of the current industrial economy where the city operates on a linear model of importing products and producing waste.

To become a Fab City requires having a more precise knowledge of the way cities work. The Fab City Expert Meeting is gathering world leaders on digital fabrication, innovation and urban design in order to look on future models of operations and research for the Fab City project. It will be organised in participatory sessions in which the best skills and knowledge from participants will be oriented towards a common direction of efforts in order to transform the way we work, live and play in cities. We aim to end up with a road map in order to look for funding and organisation opportunities for the future of Fab Cities.

Tomas Diez and Massimo Menichinelli from IAAC | Fab Lab Barcelona participated in this event, promoting the MAKE-IT project and discussing its related topics with the experts of the summit.

The Fab City Campus is a temporary and freely accessible campus open between 1 April until 26 June at the head of Amsterdam’s Java Island in the city’s Eastern Harbour District. Conceived as a green, self-sustaining city, FabCity comprises of approximately 50 innovative pavilions, installations and prototypes. More than 400 young students, professionals, artists and creatives are developing the site into a sustainable urban area, where they work, create, explore and present their solutions for current urban issues. The participants come from various educational backgrounds, including art and technology academics, universities and vocational colleges.