Fashion Revolution brings HOPE at Reworks Agora

Let us explore sustainability in fashion, innovation and sustainable materials through a prism of critical thinking, the role of technology in a transparent supply chain and suggestions from experts and designers on environmental challenges.

How ethical are the brands you are buying your clothes from? How can we prevent climate change through the way we dress?

The Future of Greek Cinema: Challenges, New Ideas & Good Practices

Are streaming platforms the future of cinema? What are the dangers and challenges of a festival? How are films made in a pandemic period?

Cinema is one of the entertainment industries that got bitten from the pandemic really heavily, one festival after another may be postponed or completely changed, but the inspiration and the appetite for creation can not stop the people of the field who are always available to offer and interact.

From Cinobo with Daphne Bechtsi, at the Drama Festival with Giannis Sakaridis to the experienced point of view of the producer and director Elina Psykou.

Democratizing Cities – Shaping urban daily life with civic participation: the role of middle-bottom-up initiatives

The “Democratic City” has been a much-discussed notion internationally, especially in the last decade. It can be viewed from different, yet interconnected, angles: social, economical, cultural and of course political. It has been tightly connected to the power that cities -should- gain to manage their own decision-making and management independence in relation to the central state, based on their local assets, needs and resources.

The “Democratic City” develops upon just, transparent, efficient and effective, responsible, inclusive and enabling governance models and systems. Respectively, civic participation plays a huge role in this City, and can be approached from three dimensions: the top-down, where we find the formal and institutional streams of participation in decision making and governance, the bottom-up, which includes informal and activistic movements of participation, and the middle one, which consists of organised structures, such as non-profit organisations, the private sector and other collaborative initiatives, that could hold the role of facilitating the dialogue between the top and bottom.

This middle layer seems to enable and provide the platform for urban dwellers to participate in the formation of their urban daily life. Either via non-formal education, culture, environmental awareness, community building, design and systems thinking, placemaking or other forms of activation and engagement, these initiatives play an important role in the development of a culture of civic participation.

In our panel discussion we host representatives of four such initiatives from Thessaloniki, dealing with a variety of thematic fields and representing different forms of organisation.

In their dialogue they reflect upon their approach and experience of enabling participation, social interaction and the sense of collectivity, while touching upon the role of urban governance.