Imaginarius Festival, Santa Maria da Feira — Outdoor Arts and City Making, 21st–24th May 2026

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Copenhagen residency, Danish Architecture Centre — DAC — Strategic urban governance initiative with Danish city CEOs and senior leaders; lecture at the Royal Danish Academy and the DAC in Dialogue lecture and discussion: How will we judge today’s cities tomorrow? Failures, successes and the future of city making. Conversation with Helle Søholt, Founding Partner of Gehl, and Frederik Fryland, Associate, Urban Development and Investments at Urban Partners, 30th April–4th May 2026

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Dresden, Creative Bureaucracy, Town Hall, 26th March 2026

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Head down in research and book writing …

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Milano, Visiting Professor, Polytechnic of Design — week-long course with master students, emphasizing how every design discipline contributes to city making, 15th–20th February 2026

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Wiesbaden, Public Next — Zusammenarbeit zwischen Stadt und Heimathafen, 28th January 2026

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Dublin: Creative Ireland & its Creative Bureaucracy, 8th December 2025

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Bratislava, final Cities Ahead Initiative of the Goethe-Institut — guiding, moderating and creating a report, 26th–27th November 2025‍

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Create in Izmir EXPO — presentation: Cities Transformed by Imagination: Then & Now, 22nd–25th November 2025

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Lumiere, Durham — Light & the City talk, 13th–14th November 2025

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The Art of City Making, Hawkwood, Stroud, Centre for Future Thinking — two-day residency, 5th–6th November 2025

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Mobi Summit, Oeiras/Lisbon — co-curator of the event, 21st–22nd October 2025

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Bamberg, Cities Ahead Initiative of the Goethe-Institut — guiding, moderating and creating a report of the event, 19th–21st October 2025

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Apolitical Day, London, 8th October 2025

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Krakow, The Dragon’s Teeth — 10th Aspire Conference, 7th October 2025

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Placemaking Europe, Reggio Emilia — What Triggers Change & the Transformative Effect; received the Conductor of Placemaking award, 23rd–26th September 2025

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Porto — lecture to mayoral candidates: Porto: Then, Now & Tomorrow, 18th September 2025

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Braga, Portugal — How Can Braga Maximize its Potential? A strategic overview, 15th–17th September 2025

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Rethinking Urban Innovation in a World on the Move

September 4th - Keynote in Izmir, Turkey.

At the Brain Circulation, Digital Nomads and the Future of Urban Innovation Summit.

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Conexiones Creativas the Latin American platform for creative economies and districts extended its partnership with Brazilian cities with a launch in Porto Alegre where Charles helped kick start the initiative.

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I’ve always wanted to go to Curitiba, having spent several days with Jaime Lerner, then mayor of the city and inventor of the ‘urban acupuncture’ concept. They won our Bay Awards ‘pioneering city’ prize. Finally, I got there, did various presentations and was guided around the city by the Jaime Lerner Institute including Jaime’s daughter Ilana and Ariadne do Santos Daher.

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BLOXHUB in Copenhagen hosted the 1st WRLD CTY Global Fellows Circle for a 3-day learning journey and residency with 30 people from across all continents. One big experience was seeing how you actually implement climate mitigation projects.

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The Goethe Institute’s Cities Ahead Academy programme has taken place in Essen, Krefeld and Rüsselsheim in summer 2025 with further Academies scheduled for Bamberg and Bratislava in the autumn. https://www.goethe.de/en/kul/wis/bik/cah.html

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Braga won the European Capital of Innovation Rising City Award in 2025 and in September together with Braga Charles and Robyn Bennett we are revising the Creative City Index by merging it with ‘Art of Creative City Making’ evaluation template to create a more nuanced tool.

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Placemaking Week Europe is holding its 7th edition in Reggio Emilia on the 23rd- 26th September. Charles will be speaking as well as moderating the morning of the 25th.

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Vilnius is interested in pursuing the ‘Cities of Ambition’ (download book) and Charles will take part in a couple of forums in the autumn.

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The launch of Charles’ Symposium series will take place at the Hawkwood Centre for Future Thinking in Stroud in collaboration with WRLD CTY (INSERT LINK) starting at 4pm on the 5th November and ending at4pm on the 7th. 

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Charles will be taking part in ‘The Fate of Britain Convention’ at Conway Hall, London on the 11th September. It is a call to collaborate on making a better, kinder, more connected country. To rebuild the Britain we know in our hearts we can do while being real about what we see around us: A multifaceted-intersecting-shit-show of climate, inequality and the cost of living. Together we can be the answer, but only if we’re able to become infinitely greater than the sum of our parts.

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Charles is advisor to the Global Parliament of Mayors and responsible for their strand on the role of culture. The annual summit took place in Braga in June 

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Latitude59 the Nordic start up summit, Tallinn helping to launch the Krulli development project on the them city making as gardening. May 2025

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Cities at the Centre – UNESCO Creativity Day, Vilnius May 2025

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Culture Shock, rethinking Stroud cultural story, April 2025

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Chtiiing Les Journées nantaises de la créativité  Nantes Next steps for creative districts, April 2025

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German Creative Economy Summit, Hamburg, ‘what is this creativity business about?’ March 2025

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UNDP Innovation Days Istanbul March 2025

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Digital Kick off Day, Creative Bureaucracy Festival, Berlin, March 2025

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The World Government Summit Dubai February 2025 ‘A zero bureaucracy or creative bureaucracy’ presentation 

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PUBLICA25, Circolo Bellas Artes, Madrid, Sustainability & Cities, February 2025

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UrbCitPower: Empowering citizens for agency as driver for change in cities, Interreg Europe, Braga. Launch talk. February 2025