Nuits Sonores 2011 – our highlights
A couple of weeks ago we were lucky enough to spend four days (and nights!) at Lyon’s indie and electronic music festival, Nuits Sonores. Now in its ninth year, the festival attracts thousands of visitors from all around Europe and is, of course, incredibly popular with the Lyonnaise too. Thanks to the full support of the people of Lyon (including Gérard Collomb, the mayor), festivities take place across the whole city – in trendy bars and clubs, at the city’s Museum of Contemporary Arts, the 17th-century city hall, the Piscine du Rhone – the list is endless!
With international acts such as DJ Shadow and Caribou on the line-up, choosing our favourite festival moments hasn’t been an easy job. However, after much deliberation, we’ve managed to narrow them down to our top 5 – scroll down to see them. Do you agree?
Next year will see Nuits Sonores celebrating its 10th birthday, and we’re sure that they’ll be doing it in style. If you could choose any indie or electronic music artist to play, who would it be? Are there any venues in Lyon that you’d like to see it take place at? Why not let us know by commenting on this post.
Our top 5 highlights
1) The animal agility competition!
2) DJ sets at the Piscine Du Rhone
3) Partying at Apéro Sonore Sonnenstrasse
4) Bathing in the visual spectacle of DJ Shadow’s set at Scène 1 – Marché Gare
5) Watching the Sonics thrash out some of their classics on the guitar
ALL IMAGES ©www.b-rob.com
A look back at the two days of discussions in Valencia, Spain, on brand management and the attractiveness of cities
For the past two months, I have been in charge of the web marketing strategy of the onlylyon.org and aderly.com websites, as well as of the social networks that we have set up to promote and heighten the visibility of our beautiful city of Lyon, through ONLYLYON. On a regular basis, the ONLYLYON team and I will be posting articles on the ONLYLYON strategy, feedback about our travels, our latest favorites, etc. So it was to represent the ONLYLYON team that I went to Eurocities in mid-September for two days of discussions about brand management and the attractiveness of cities, in Valencia, Spain (which was quite pleasant, if I may say so myself!).
Eurocities is a European network that groups together about 100 cities with over 250,000 inhabitants. The network brings these cities together in order to work, reflect, promote and cooperate on all the issues surrounding economic development, mobility, local area marketing, culture, the environment and more. This network provides opportunities for encounters and exchanges between cities, regarding good practices associated with these topics.
But now let’s get back to the two days of discussions. First of all, the city presentations were very interesting and relevant, regarding local area marketing strategies set up to develop cities and change their images, of course, but also to help them weather a difficult economic period. No, local area marketing is not just about communications – it’s also a real tool for the economic development and vitality of a local area! For many of the attending cities, local marketing has revealed new possibilities for their economic development, and brought about a genuine renewal that involved the city and all its residents. These two days of discussions on the attractiveness of cities also focused attention on the importance of the past in building a city of the future and highlighting its riches. Should we focus more on our history and our roots and draw out the essence, to find what will make our city more attractive? The answer is yes.
Let’s take the example of Genoa in Italy which is especially interesting. The transformation undertaken by the city to emerge from the industrial crisis of the 80’s perfectly illustrates this ability to look to the past to find the strengths of the present. The city reoriented itself towards the sea and the harbor, which was completely redesigned by Renzo Piano. Genoa rediscovered and drew attention back to its historic center and its famous ancestors (Christopher Columbus and Paganini). It also developed tourism, making it a leading sector and thereby enabling the city to experience an economic revival (which still keeps it going today).
The city got a second wind and a new logo to illustrate it (redone by Renzo Piano as well) with a new baseline: Genoa, Urban Lab. The city presents itself this way because it is now in motion and undergoing change with its new, totally remodeled harbor and the arrival of high-tech companies, etc. And famous figures such as Christopher Columbus reminded the city that it had adventurous, pioneering and enterprising ancestors. As a result, the city has become daring, turning to development in innovative business sectors to further its own economic development. In this strategy of local marketing, utmost importance has been given to the citizens, so as to make them part of this new transformation of the city. Even though it is difficult at times in the beginning, it is crucial to make people part of the process of promoting and enhancing cities, because they are the city’s best ambassadors.
Valencia was another real surprise due to its size and quality and the rapid development of this city on the Mediterranean coast. It is characterized by a rich past and recent development, illustrated by very modern and design-oriented urban planning, as shown by the city of arts and sciences.Valencia, with the slogan “incredible but true” is chock full of advantages that make it a great city to discover! My favorite way of discovering it is through a film promoting Valencia in the form of a movie trailer worthy of the biggest Hollywood productions! Watch the English version.
The Eurocities meeting also included the example of Gent in Belgium, which launched a local area marketing strategy a few years ago to promote its advantages and enhance the attractiveness of the city compared with Bruges, a very well known neighboring city. Gent also focused heavily on its heritage and the richness of the past to make the city a tourist destination. This city also wants to get the citizens and companies talking about Gent when they travel.
There is no ready-made recipe to succeed in promoting a city effectively. A customized solution has to be found for each city, by delving into its past and its roots to find its advantages, and especially what makes it special, in order to discover renewal, development and growth.
Everyone at the Eurocities forum fell for the city of Karlstad in Sweden, which has an atypical positioning, but appealed to the audience. The city has not changed its logo in 20 years. It’s a logo that was drawn by children. Karlstad sees itself as the city of the sun, and everything revolves around this symbol (quality of life, sun, well being): in a way, it’s northern Europe’s little ray of sunshine!
[Branding] Eurocities launches a working group on City Branding and Attractiveness in Lyon
![eurocities lyon [Branding] Eurocities launches a working group on City Branding and Attractiveness in Lyon](http://ilsontchoisilyon.com/blog_version_francaise/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/eurocities-lyon.jpg "[Branding] Eurocities launches a working group on City Branding and Attractiveness in Lyon")
Yesterday, Lyon hosted a meeting of representatives from 38 European cities, convened by EUROCITIES, the network of major European cities. The purpose of this meeting was to launch a working group that is to focus on Brand Management and Attractiveness in the major cities of Europe.
The participants addressed topics such as urban marketing, the creation of a brand for a city (such as the ONLYLYON brand), economic governance models and the difficulty of changing the image of a city. Around the table were representatives from cities such as Manchester, Tampere, Lublin, Katowice, Nantes and Gothenburg.
This working group will be followed by other groups of the same kind throughout 2010. Read more about it +