The Art of Citymaking Festival Makes International Debut in Singapore to Celebrate 10th Edition of World Cities Summit
A one-day festival on how cities are made through culture, creativity and human experience — closing with an Oxford-style debate presented by The New York Times.
“Cities are jazz, not architecture. The score is loose, the players keep arriving, and the music is whatever happens when they listen to each other.”
SINGAPORE, 26 MAY 2026 — The Art of Citymaking Festival will take place on 17 June 2026 at the Glass Dome, bringing together more than 250 urban leaders, creatives, policymakers and practitioners for an intimate, curated gathering on how cities are shaped through culture, creativity and human experience. An official Associated Event of the World Cities Summit 2026 (14–16 June, Suntec Singapore), the inaugural festival opens the day after the Summit closes — when thousands of mayors, planners and city leaders from around the world are gathered in Singapore.
The festival is the public centrepiece of the inaugural Creators in Residence — a week-long gathering of artists, urbanists and city-makers in Singapore from 13–20 June, anchored by the acclaimed British public-realm producer Helen Marriage, founder of Artichoke and creator of The Sultan’s Elephant and Lumiere. On 17 June, the week opens to the public at the Glass Dome.
Singapore offers a fitting setting: a city-state that has deliberately designed its environment, housing, mobility and public spaces around healthy human life — what Blue Zones founder Dan Buettner has described as an “engineered”, or man-made, Blue Zone.
Charles Landry, Festival President and originator of the “Creative City” concept, will open the festival with a keynote dialogue. Landry’s books The Creative City and The Art of City-Making established creativity and culture as drivers of urban development; the latter is the intellectual foundation of the festival.
Mr Charles Landry, Festival President, The Art of Citymaking Festival said: “The city is the greatest collective work of art we make. Its true measure is how well it lets people live, connect, and become.”
Mr Anupam Yog, Festival Director, The Art of Citymaking Festival said: “We set out to create the cultural counterpoint to the policy conversation — a room where artists, mayors, investors and citizens think together about what makes a city worth living in. Holding it the day after the World Cities Summit means the people shaping the world’s cities are already here.”
The festival is organised around three themes: Adaptive Neighbourhoods (how cities adapt to people across lifetimes), Urban Software (how connection, participation and lived experience shape cities in practice), and Placemaking & Legacy (how culture and identity shape places that endure and evolve).
More than 40 speakers are confirmed across the day. Highlights include Cities at Scale with Sanjeev Sanyal, Economic Advisor to the Prime Minister of India; the launch of the Conscious Cities Index (an XDG Labs initiative); the world debut of Countless Cities Asia; and contributions from Helen Marriage (Artichoke), Lily Kuo (The New York Times), Carla and Viola Bartoli (Farm Cultural Park) and Raj Ahuja (WSDM Haus). A fireside chat between Jen Williams, CEO of the Committee for Brisbane, and Prantik Mazumdar, investor and President of TiE Singapore, will explore how Brisbane is planning for the arrival of the Olympic Games in 2032.
The festival closes with a live Oxford-style debate presented by The New York Times, moderated by journalist Lily Kuo, on the motion: “The way we measure city success is fundamentally wrong.”
The festival is convened by Leadership for Cities, with Airbnb as Official Citymaking Partner. Friends of the festival include Bloxhub, Common Purpose, Farm Cultural Park, the Global Cultural Districts Network (GCDN), Think City and the Urban Land Institute (ULI). Its year-round community, The Citymaking Circle, carries the work on between editions.
Mr Peter Hyland, Chair, Leadership for Cities, said: “Cities are more than physical infrastructure — they are shaped by how people experience, care for, and connect within them. We hope The Art of Citymaking Festival broadens the conversation on what makes a good city and inspires deeper thinking around the social and cultural dimensions of urban life. We are proud to bring together diverse voices to help shape more positive and liveable cities for all.”
The festival pass is priced at $188 and includes the full-day programme (10:00am – 8:00pm) of keynotes, panels, film and immersive experiences, the New York Times debate finale, lunch, refreshments and the closing reception.
For the full programme, speaker line-up and tickets, visit leadershipforcities.com.
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The Art of Citymaking Festival is an official associated event of the World Cities Summit, positioned as the creative counterpart to the Summit’s governance focus. Taking place the day after the Summit, the festival continues the conversation by bringing together urban leaders, creatives, policymakers, and practitioners to explore how cities are shaped through culture, creativity, and human experience — asking what happens when policy becomes lived urban reality.
Organised around three themes — Adaptive Neighbourhoods, Urban Software, and Placemaking & Legacy — the Festival is supported by The Citymaking Circle, a 150-member year-round community for practitioners building urban legacy. The inaugural Festival takes place on 17 June 2026 in Singapore.
The Festival serves as the public centrepiece of Creators in Residence, a week-long programme weaving together practitioners across design, creative industries, innovation, culture and ancestral intelligence.
The Festival is convened by Leadership for Cities — www.leadershipforcities.com.