After the enthusiasm for the project upon launching it last year (over 130 people signed up as potential hosts and travellers!), I’m excited to be picking things up again, and to continue developing Collaborative Residencies as a model and a community network.
The place I’m hoping to do that from, this Spring, is in Barcelona; I’m planning to be there during March and April.
This post is to share more information with anyone who might be interested to get involved with the project while I’m in Spain — whether as a potential host, a fellow traveller, or collaborating on pop-up events and projects.
If the concept / project is already on your radar via my LinkedIn posts and you’d like to offer to host me, you can head straight to the expression of interest form (which contains just a few quick questions to make it easier for us to connect)
Or if you’re just interested to stay in the loop about connecting with the project while I’m in the city — perhaps participating in events / workshops etc. — you can sign up below and I’ll add you to a Barcelona-specific list 👇
In the meantime, read on for more about what I’m lining up!
Why am I coming to Barcelona?
One of the key motivations behind Collaborative Residencies is to experiment with more participatory, reciprocal, and community-oriented forms of travel.
Barcelona — with its notorious struggle against the rise of Airbnb and over-tourism — stands out as a place where this kind of inquiry could be particularly ripe.
True to its history of radicalism and resistance, the city is taking bold measures, including a ban on short-term rentals set to come in in 2028. At the same time, tourism accounts for roughly 12% of Barcelona’s economy, employing 130,000 people and generating close to €100 million through tourist-related taxes. [1]
This tension — between the economic benefits and the pitfalls of tourism — is being felt in cities world-wide. And while banning Airbnbs is (in my view) undoubtedly a step in the right direction, it still leaves open questions around what a positive model of travel might look like.
Questions I’m bringing
How might visitors still come to Barcelona in a way that connects more deeply with (rather than displaces and disrupts) local residents?
How might stays in the city be fundamentally oriented around reciprocity, involving a creative meeting and exchange of ideas, skills, and values?
I don’t presume to have the answers to these questions. I’m hoping that by staying with a resident of Barcelona, and by collaborating with them and other local people within their own context, we might be able to:
Speculate and develop the Collaborative Residency model together.
Seed the potential for further residencies in Barcelona, and in other cities, involving a wider range of people.
Overthrow capitalism and have a good time doing it.
The last is perhaps a little ambitious, but that’s the spirit I’ll be bringing and indeed hoping to tap into in Catalonia :)
What might the residency be like?
Collaborative Residencies aim to connect hosts and guests who share complementary interests and skill-sets, and to enable a value exchange that goes deeper than the rental transaction typical of tourism, and deeper than the commercial, impersonal context that typically frames how we connect and work with one another professionally.
The type and the degree of ‘collaboration’ varies. Some people are interested in a more focused exchange around a specific project, and may not have so much free time to hang out with their guest. Others are happy simply to share their space and collaborate in a more emergent way, perhaps exploring the city together for inspiration, discussing ideas over meals etc.
I personally enjoy something in the middle, where there’s some focused ‘containers’ for collaborating, as well as ‘free’ time for just hanging out together. But the shape this takes is ultimately co-creative and something which is best figured out together — in advance, with a call or two to align and plan a little, as well as during the residency.
Every residency is different, and a sort of experiment in itself. To some extent, we’ll be figuring things out as we go, and the most successful residencies involve a spirit of openness and curiosity.
If you want to get a better sense of what a residency might be like, I’ve written about the experience from my side in this post, and people have also shared their reflections on hosting me, here and here.
An impromptu collaborative-kitchen-workshop, during one of my previous residencies in Amsterdam
At this stage, therefore, I can only outline what I would be hoping to bring to a Collaborative Residency from my side, and see if it interests someone enough to explore things further.
What I’m working on, and how we could collaborate
At a basic level, I’m hoping that my host will be interested to collaborate on the Collaborative Residencies project itself — to think about the model together, to record / write up some reflections, and to find ways of creating and sharing learnings with others in Barcelona and further afield.
We could, for instance, organise and host one or two pop-up events together — a talk, a walk, a workshop, something like that. This could potentially be at the host’s home, if suitable, or we could look for a venue to host us.
To get a sense of what I’m working on more generally — of the kind of skill-set I could bring to a collaboration, and where our interests might intersect — the best thing is probably to have a read of my latest public journal entry, where I share some relevant information.
The most relevant things are probably:
Garden Thinking — A project exploring how we might radically re-imagine the garden as a site for the regeneration of civic life and thought, particularly in urban contexts.
Ways with Words — My creative studio, through which I’ll be producing more articles, stories, and maybe a podcast, as well as running collaborative reading and writing initiatives.
I imagine there could potentially be alignment and shared interest with hosts from civil society organisations, and from fields including design, futures, tourism, funding, academia, architecture, activism, horticulture, and more.
I love collaborating across disciplines, and bringing a curious, co-creative approach to whatever projects / challenges I might be able to support with.
Might you (or someone you know) be interested to host me?
The key things to know are:
Dates
I’m looking to be based in Barcelona between roughly mid-February until the end of April, and to stay with people who could host me for a stint of at least 1 month during that time.
(How long it takes to ‘properly’ connect with a place and the people living there is like asking ‘how long is a piece of string’. But in my experience, a month is about right for getting grounded and seeding long-lasting relationships.)
Space
I’m looking for someone who can offer me a room of my own, rather than my needing to sleep in a shared space.
I’ve slept on my fair share of couches and floor-spaces, and am happy doing so here and there. But for these residencies, I’m ideally looking to be able to have my own space — particularly since some of my independent work involves video calls.
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Those are pretty much the only essentials. Beyond that, the rest is up for exploration!
If you’re interested to host me, complete the form below and I’ll reach out to you 👇
That’s all for now!
I’ll be reaching out to potential hosts over the coming weeks, and will hopefully have things lined up by the time I arrive mid-February.
If you’d like to follow along as things develop, you join me on the journey by subscribing, here.
Best,
Will
Collaborative Residencies
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