PLUS HUB: A CULTURAL CREATIVE PROCESS FOR PISTICCI REGENERATION (MATERA, ITALY)

Abstract

Culture-led urban regeneration strategies are becoming interesting processes at European,
national, regional and local level, able to activate innovative productivity systems where
interplay culture and creativity in urban districts, adaptive reuse of buildings and industrial
sites, and bottom-up cooperation. A culture-led regeneration process is able to set the scene
and create the enabling conditions to promote cultural and creative industries, supporting
alternative and situated forms of governance and management of local resources.
According to this approach, the research aims at responding to a yet open question in placebased
regeneration policies and strategies: how the cultural and creative production could
implement inclusive strategies of culture-led urban regeneration, in a framework of Circular
Economy, through evaluation processes? The paper introduces the experience of the socalled
“PLUS – Pisticci Laboratorio Urbano Sostenibile” (Pisticci Sustainable Urban Lab),
a “community hub” developed within the framework of Matera ECoC 2019, in Pisticci
(MT), the third-largest town in Basilicata (Italy).
Keywords: community values, cultural creative enterprises, local circular economies