027: What’s your dream project?

Villagers! Town folks! Urbanites! Welcome to another issue of the Villager‘s dispatch.

One of the most visited pages on our website is the project wish / block list. Initially, this list was just for us and our internal positioning. But briefly after we published it, we got a lot of positive feedback, and people told us they wished for their employers and companies to maintain something similar. It’s not that hard, after all: we all live by certain values; writing them down helps us to coordinate life—and work, in our case. It allows us to focus on the right things.

The list is practical for a first glance. However, we decided to go more into detail, and asked the team: Who would your dream client be? What project would you looove to work on?

Doro replied:

I would love to work with organizations that are fighting for social justice and promote equity. I’m interested in urban planning and projects with cities, communities, neighborhoods—all about infrastructure that enhances people’s quality of life. Some organisations I would like to cooperate with are: VHS (Volkshochschulen Berlin), Karuna eG, Reporter Ohne Grenzen, f5

Christoph (me, as I am typing this newsletter, hello):

I’d love to work with local and public institutions; my dream would be to create a new and better digital tool for public libraries—for both citizens and librarians. I think public libraries have so much potential in our communities, and digital infrastructure is crucial there. I could also imagine that teaming up with consumer protection services or independent product testers (like Stiftung Warentest) could be fun and interesting, and quite relevant in the digital consumerist realm we live in. And, as these publications really inspired me when I was a teenager, I’d love to work with editorial teams like fluter.de from the bpb.

Fei said:

I’d be very happy to support with developing digital tools and platforms that either strengthen local communities or make education more accessible. Some projects/orgs that come to my mind are Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung, Too Good to Go, Betterplace.org, Khan Academy, Nebenan.de, The Breakfast App, Deutschlandfunk, ... Also, since I’m personally very passionate about arts and music, I’d be up for working on projects in those areas, for example with Museum Barberini, Berlinische Galerie, Komische Oper Berlin, Berliner Bühnen... or something much smaller, more unconventional, niche or even obscure.

And Harry, who kicked off the initial question, seems to maintain a long list of dream collaborators in his head:

I would be delighted to work with the WWF, Greenpeace, progressive journalism (e.g. ZEIT ONLINE, the taz, Krautreporter), PeTA, Lush, vegan clothing companies (e.g. Zeta Shoes) or vegan food companies (e.g. Veganz), Wikimedia, the FSF, the W3C, government tech that real people use and also teaming up with literally any other cooperative, union or the ICA itself! Nintendo would be ace, for some childhood nostalgia. Broadly speaking: More women-led/founded companies, as well as cultural/public institutions like museums, exhibitions, libraries, public transport (e.g. the BVG) or public broadcasting! Oh, and as a sci-fi and space nerd, working with NASA or ESA would be a dream come true.

Know anyone working at the organisations and companies mentioned above? We’d be super grateful for an introduction!

And, truth be told: We already have our dream project partners! Our collaborations with DemNext, Publix or the Sovereign Tech Fund, just to name a few, are absolute dream projects which we’re super proud of.

Let’s team up?

If you have a project, platform or tool that fits one of the areas mentioned above, and are looking for a team of designers and developers to work with: we’re all ears! Simply shoot us an email.

Office Hours!

If you’re not too keen on emails: Book yourself a slot in our freshly introduced office hours! Twice a week, we make time to chat to people about projects, coops and other great ideas.

And to finish off the week and this little email, here’s a thought prompt for you: What would your absolute dream team or dream project or dream client be like?

Let us know! So long: All the best from around town.
Christoph and the villagers