Placemaking
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Placemaking inspires people to collectively reimagine and reinvent public spaces as the heart of their community.
An Idea
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Meet At The Square is inspired by the African village square, which is traditionally known as a hub that creates a nexus between social interaction, play, and storytelling. This project explores the idea of sharing and collective aspiration.
Located in Mini Campos Square on Lagos Island, from the 2nd to the 5th of November 2019, we will be asking people to paint, write or draw their response to the question "What Does Community Mean To You?", and then install it in the gallery.
The Concept
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"With the recent influx of architecture firms, photography studios, and fashion ateliers we believe that Lagos Island is becoming the design and creativity hub of Lagos State. When Made Culture approached us to design an installation at Mini Campos Square, our immediate thought was to create a space that will not only inspire the community but allow them to use creativity as an outlet for play.
We looked to the environment to influence our design and material choice. We spent time observing residence around the square and its use as a prayer and community meeting ground.
The idea was to design a space that would be functional and inspire all ages; creating a gallery space for the children and playground for the adults."
Nifemi Marcus-Bello
Design Lead, nmbello Studio
The Outcome
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What we found is that there is indeed a relationship between people and place which creates a great sense of collective values, aspiration and attachment.
It is our hope to make Meet At the Square a travelling installation and share our learnings with city authorities as a toolkit for placemaking in public spaces in Lagos.
The Team
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Malaika Toyo
Director, Made Culture
Malaika Toyo is interested in developing innovative and collaborative solutions that support Africans to live better lives. As director of Made Culture, she leads a team of experts to design, plan and implement high-impact projects; advising and developing strategies for youth development and job creation specifically through tech, media and the creative industries. She is also a director at A Whitespace Creative Agency; Festival Director of Tiwa N’ Tiwa Street Art Festival.
Nifemi Marcus-Bello
Founder, nmbello Studio
Nifemi Marcus-Bello is an Industrial designer living and working in Lagos, Nigeria. As a designer Nifemi is driven by sustainability, exploiting material property, and taking into great consideration the end user of a product while keeping in mind economic viability. He believes that through extensive research and empathy, a great design is born. Prior to starting nmbello Studio, Nifemi worked as a lead designer in the medical, mobile phone and furniture industry.
Taiwo Joel Abisoye
Artist
Taiwo Abisoye is a contemporary art sculptor based in Ile Ife, Nigeria. His work specializes in the use for scrap metal to create small and large scale art pieces. He is an exhibiting member of the Society of Nigeria Artist and has participated in several local and international exhibitions. He recently participated in the “upcycling the new economy” workshop organized by IICD center in collaboration with the U. S. Embassy
In 2018, Watershed Art Trust - UK announced an investment fund of £10,000 for the creation of six global public space art projects as part of their Creative Producers’ International initiative.
Made Culture won the bid to produce Meet At the Square which is to become a two-year travelling public art installation in Lagos, Nigeria.
Our Partners
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