Cultural Quarters as Mechanisms for Urban Regeneration. Part 1: Conceptualising Cultural Quarters

Abstract

Introduction: Cultural Quarters and Urban Regeneration This paper reviews the concept of the cultural quarter as an approach to urban regeneration. It considers the policy objectives of making such designations, the approach to ‘making’ places which are deemed to be more rather than less artistic and cultural in the broader senses of the word, and the methods and mechanisms for implementation and ongoing management. The paper draws heavily on case studies in describing events as they occurred, and in making comparisons between cultural quarters. The work is published in two parts. Part 1 is a conceptualisation of the term cultural quarter, discussing in broad terms what is meant by this now almostorthodox terminology. This Part draws heavily on the urban literature, especially on theories of city growth, economic development and urban design. It concludes with an idealised typology of what makes for a ‘good’ cultural quarter, presented as a series of necessary conditions and success factors. This is applied and evaluated in more detail in Part 2, which considers four case-study examples drawn from the United Kingdom (UK), Ireland and Australia. In most of the examples referred to in Part 2, planning and development powers have been used to preserve and encourage cultural production and consumption. Moreover, cultural quarters are often seen as part of a larger strategy integrating cultural and economic development. This is usually linked to the redevelopment or regeneration of a selected inner urban area, in which mixed-use urban development is to be encouraged and the public realm is to be reconfigured. In other words, cultural quarters tend to combine strategies for greater consumption of the arts and culture with cultural production and urban place making. Most great cities have identifiable quarters to which artists and cultural entrepreneurs are attracted, whether it is Soho in London, New York’s Lower East Side, or the Left Bank in Paris (Montgomery, 1998). (For a discussion of the links between city development, creativity and special places within cities, see Hall (1998) and Landry (2000).) Such places have a long history and appear