České Budějovice learns from Chemnitz 2025: inspiration, community energy, and new contacts

Together with young creators from the Young Creators platform and community leaders from České Budějovice, we visited Chemnitz – the current European Capital of Culture 2025. Our goal was to soak up inspiration, learn about specific projects, meet active people from the community, and see how culture can change a city and the lives of its inhabitants.
And we learned from the best – Chemnitz is currently at the peak of its cultural year, so we were able to see the results of long-term work, cooperation, and the courage to try new things. Not only from institutions, but above all from people.

The meetings that moved us forward the most

It was a great honor to meet Mayor Sven Schulz, who shared with us the importance of civic participation, political courage, and trust in the community, as well as the European Capital of Culture project. This was a powerful encouragement for our participants: young and isolated residents can be agents of change and future leaders—and they don't have to wait for anything.

During our trip, we established connections with several inspiring projects and people, such as:

TEAM GENERATION, which works with people across cities and PROJECTS:

• DANCING NEIGHBOURS – connects generations and cultures through dance, promotes active living for seniors (around 90 are currently participating in the project), and brings international collaboration with Japanese choreographers focused on movement, health, longevity, and connecting older residents of Chemnitz.
• MBA (The Makers, Business & Arts), which connects art, business, and tourism and develops places where creativity becomes the engine of the local economy and cultural life.
• KOSMOS FESTIVAL CHEMNITZ, which is based on participation – it involves residents and draws them into an open dialogue about democracy and society. It does this through unexpected, unconventional cultural and public events that bring people back into the public space. The basis for positive change is the potential of the citizens themselves – after all, it is thanks to their ingenuity, improvisation, passion, imagination, and belief in their own abilities that they have shaped the history of their city.
• EUROPEAN PEACE RIDE – continues the tradition of the International Peace Race, connecting Europeans through a joint bike ride across countries that combines sport, culture, and the idea of peace – symbolically reminding us that a true European community is formed by encounters along the way.
• Enter – Youth Cultural Region – opens up new opportunities and spaces for young people to experiment, create, and collaborate in the field of culture across Chemnitz and its 38 partner municipalities until 2029.
• #3000 Garagen & Garagen Campus – The project transforms former garages from the GDR era in Chemnitz into places of encounter, art, and living memory of the city. It thus presents a new creative use for these spaces, transforming them from forgotten urban spaces into the future of the city and its cultural infrastructure.

Our meetings were not just presentations, but mutual inspiration, sharing practical experiences, joint activities, sharing emotions, and searching for common topics.

Our visit was one of the steps in the cooperation between České Budějovice 2028 and Chemnitz 2025. We want to continue this cooperation—sharing experiences, meeting, learning from each other, and searching for new forms of cultural leadership.

What's next? 

We want this to be the beginning of a long-term partnership—not only between organizations, but mainly between people, communities, and young active creators.