Fun Palaces: Anywhere, anytime, any size…

Fun Palaces are about sharing skills and making local connections.

Did you know that you can make a Fun Palace at any time of year? All you need is someone* (or someones) to help you (we call them Makers) to lead activities, talks, experiments, workshops or sort logistics and a space to hold your Fun Palace in and you are good to go. *And if you want to do it on your own, that’s okay too!

Fun Palaces can have anything from 2 to 2000 participants (people who visit your Fun Palace). Some Fun Palaces are Tiny, which may be just 3 or 4 people sharing skills together. Fun Palaces don’t need to be polished or perfect – small and scrappy ones are every bit as good as bigger ones.

A Tiny Fun Palace could be a shared creation made by three neighbours along a wall, a seed swap in your street, a drumming lesson from a balcony window, six people in a park teaching each other a 45-minute dance or yoga or fitness sequence or a neighbourhood co-writing a story in chalk on the pavement.

Or you could hold a Digital Fun Palace. You could broadcast your knitting tutorial on Facebook live, write a shared poem on Twitter, share art on Instagram, or hold a dance-off via video conference. Whether offline or online, the key is to share skills, knowledge, something beautiful; that it is public (passers-by taking part is great) and makes a connection (encouraging others to do as well as enjoy what you’ve done).

Often Fun Palaces that start off tiny grow a little with each passing year and big Fun Palaces are encouraged every bit as much as tiny ones. Maybe the Fun Palace you and your community wants to make involves taking over an entire building for the whole weekend – the sky’s the limit! 

Don’t forget: Once you know where you are making your Fun Palace and the date and time of it, sign up to go on the map and become a part of the Fun Palaces campaign.