How the NEB generates scale

The New European Bauhaus sources funds for action. Copyright European Union

The NEB is a movement and a funding ‘aggregator’ platform – a mechanism to disseminate funding aligned to its cultural values – this includes a range of EU funding bodies such as:

• Horizon
• European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT)
• EIT Knowledge and Innovation Communities (EIT KIC)

The NEB can act as a unifying platform for a range of movements, directly via partners or indirectly through its core values:

• sustainable
• beautiful
• inclusive.

There are many movements, discipline groups, advocacy groups and funding agencies that have applied these values in their resource allocation, in order to:

• enable change through culture
• design the built environment
• evolve placemaking.

The NEB advocates for a multidimensional approach, focusing on achieving positive outcomes across all three values of sustainability, beautiful and inclusion. Through harnessing the capacity of well-established groups via its networks and partnerships, the ideology embodied in NEB has a larger reach than the projects it funds directly.

The NEB is a catalyst for a broader cultural movement, through diverse funding models and disseminating ideas and knowledge through its fundings call and events such as:

• NEB lab
• NEB prizes
• NEB festival.

This can enable partners who have a direct focus on, and engagement with, the needs and wants of particular societal or discipline groups to hone their funding around the multidimensional NEB values.

Some examples include:

• NEB call for innovative projects in cities 2023
• Horizon funding: Developing digital solutions to support the NEB
• The LIFE Program
• The European Regional Development Fund
• BEDA.org.

Mechanisms to measure value and outcomes

In the following steps, we’ll draw on examples and approaches to developing sustainable cities to identify mechanisms to measure value and outcomes of projects which align to the NEB movement.

We’ll explore how these projects are leading to meaningful change and how the impacts on the well being of citizens are identified.

Top down and bottom up approaches

We’ll explore the extent to which these initiatives are top down or bottom up. In many instances, top down or government led approaches are required to facilitate large infrastructure investments or changes which in turn enable citizens to put in place creative sustainable solutions.

In others, citizens are the driving force of change resulting in meaningful bottom-up solutions, capable of mobilising resources to turn the ideas of the NEB into a reality.