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“This is the first project with external funding for Aalto University's Pori Urban Platform (PUPA). With the project Aalto will have a new type of visibility and activities in Pori. It will make PUPA a reality', says Taina Rajanti, head of research at Aalto University's Department of Art.

The City of Pori operates as an open Living Lab in the building of the innovation platform The platform is being built in connection with concrete objects, in which the implementers of the project have existing experimental and research-based information that is of interest to designers and entrepreneurs. A central aim in the project is to draw attention to the innovative significance of artistic research and work as well as cultural knowledge for the development of urban space.

The project includes the implementation of a new residential area in Karjaranta and the design of parks and green space, and the Pori Housing Fair in 2018. The fair will be a testing ground for new means of construction, for instance.

One of the projects is to update the housing fair concept. The fair will be held in Pori in 2018. The aim is to develop the event into a housing fair of international significance. The aim is to plan an area that links with the present urban structure in a living manner, producing new kinds of housing solutions. The fair will be an image builder for the City of Pori, with the aim of going beyond the one-off event to establish more extensive economic and cultural value.

Bringing together players of different fields

'The project also develops a new kind of model for teaching cultural fields in higher education based on solid cooperation with entrepreneurs and other stakeholders for the promotion of work opportunities and employment'. Rajanti says.

A new kind of model for teaching in the field of culture will guarantee continuity in the innovation platform and general applicability also outside the realm of the project itself, continuing after the project is over. Experts in the field of culture, such as artists,  producers of culture and researchers will be able to act as consultants and heads of collective information formation from the platform.

The innovation platform is based on collective information formation, and not on the one-way distribution of research data. Its flexible and networked structure is easily applicable in different kinds of conditions, meeting the needs of various experts and other participating groups. During the project the aim is to utilise both existing information on urban space and to collect new information using methods of cultural surveying and artistic research.

The Pori Live innovative collective knowledge formation as a resource of sustainable development has been granted three years worth of funding. Carrying out the plan are Aalto University (main executor), the Department of Art, the Department of Architecture, and Pori Urban Platform of Aalto University as well as the University of Turku (part-executor) - Cultural Production and Landscape Studies. Partners in collaboration include the City of Pori and its departments of urban planning and culture, parks and street design, Prizztech, the Pori Art Museum, T.E.H.D.A.S. ry, the Arts Council of Finland / Pori branch, and a working group of the Pori Cultural Foundation.