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The Urban Lab concept is aimed at creating innovations and expanding citizens’ participation in decision-making processes. This article presents the main premises of this concept, the specifics of its implementation in the conditions of Polish cities, the structure, objectives and types of activities of Urban Labs as well as functions they may perform in stimulating cooperation of the city with enterprises, scientific institutions and non-governmental organisations.

In China, Shanghai often serves as a place to introduce and try out new ideas. This is certainly the case with experimental urban planning and design solutions and sustainability transitions. This article identifies and evaluates the role of pilot projects and demonstration zones along the Huangpu River. These clusters and zones are supposed to guide the urban regeneration of the former industrial waterfronts and to accelerate innovative development in Shanghai and the wider Yangtze Delta Region. The Huangpu River as a whole is considered an urban lab and a showcase of ecological civilisation policies, with a strong ‘people oriented’ focus on improving the overall quality and attractiveness of urban life. Following three decades of rapid urban expansion, Shanghai’s urban development model is shifting toward one that emphasizes densification and the reuse of existing elements. The motto of Shanghai’s latest master plan is “Striving for an Excellent Global City.” One of the pathways to realize this expectation is the creation of thematic clusters for creative industries, financial institutes, AI, and technology, media and telecommunication industries. These clusters are high-density investment projects meant to support and accelerate the transformation of Shanghai into a service economy. There are important similarities between these projects in Shanghai and the role of urban labs in theories of sustainability transitions. Drawing on these theories and those of ecological civilization, this article examines how these so-called ‘experimental’ urban megaprojects along the river contribute to Shanghai’s effort to take the lead in developing sustainable urban transitions.

How can engagement practices remain open to new dialogues, issues and possibilities beyond existing hierarchies and often exploitative conditions? The acts of co-curation are investigated as a mode of community engagement, focusing on the Cambridge Room, an experimental urban room (UR) in Cambridge, UK. By examining three projects in one of the UK’s most unequal cities, this paper reflects on the forms and dynamics of community engagement and knowledge co-creation in URs, often seen as an alternative version to urban living labs. Drawing on emerging theories of care and civic empowerment within curatorial practices, this paper argues that co-curation in urban contexts functions as a practice of enabling, educating, critiquing and making public, reinforcing the civic dimension of participatory engagement. The Cambridge Room case study demonstrates how through co-curation URs can facilitate community-led initiatives, foster resource sharing and enhance collaboration across diverse demographic groups as multiple agents of care. At the same time, the case study reveals that co-curation faces critical challenges: building trust amid conflicting interests; engaging powerful yet underrepresented commercial stakeholders like developers; and generating robust evidence of impact through indicators including participation rates and influences on planning processes. Policy relevance Co-curation is an alternative methodological framework for community engagement, offering a critical shift away from outcome-driven and tokenistic strategies in current modes of public participation in planning. In the context of Cambridge, a priority area within the UK government’s growth plan where inequalities persist, the urgency of amplifying community voices, especially those of marginalised groups, and foregrounding local knowledge is increasingly pressing. The Cambridge Room case study suggests how co-curation can support more inclusive and flexible forms of civic engagement that document and mobilise diverse views of the city to inform policy discussions and decision-making. More broadly, within the context of URs and ULLs, co-curation can be seen not only as a method but as a political proposition that foregrounds care, dialogue, and resistance to fixed hierarchies and knowledge systems.

Urban living labs (ULLs) can be an important way to approach multi-stakeholder co-creation with regard to urban transitions and transformations. They have become a common type of co-creative experimentation, offering the opportunity to research and innovate on a wide variety of challenges in everyday settings. They test hypotheses to create pathways for a transition to sustainable urbanisation. However, there is mounting concern from practice, innovators, and research that there is little systematic integration of practical outputs. Moreover, the question of how ULLs should be designed, and by whom, requires comparative longer-term assessment. Implementation and operation requires knowledge of the risks involved. The long-term impacts of ULLs on particular places, and the general understanding of how they contribute to urban transformations, are not well theorized. Thus, intended and potential contributions to urban transformations could remain unrealized. Based on experience from a series of stakeholder dialogues and co-production formats at various ULL related conferences and workshop, this paper offers policy recommendations and directions regarding the future direction for JPI Urban Europe its main programme for 2021–2027, the European Partnership Driving Urban Transitions to a Sustainable Future in the Horizon Europe Framework Programme. It may also help other urban research and innovation funders and programming actors support sustainable transformations through urban living labs.

The contribution of the first generation of urban living labs (ULLs) to system-wide sustainability transformations is thus far less than expected. A possible explanation for this can be found in the focus of most ULLs on local, highly contextualized knowledge, and a missing link to system-wide transformations through diffusion and upscaling beyond the geographic boundaries of the lab. Meta-learning, i.e., learning across multiple, distributed experiments, through networked ULLs seems to offer a way forward. However, the literature on city networks shows that meta-learning cannot be effectively facilitated in horizontal networks without a learning infrastructure. To address this shortcoming and inspire a second generation of ULLs, this Perspective paper outlines a meta-lab approach actively facilitating the contribution of local living labs to wider sustainability transformations. We see a meta-lab as a transurban multi-actor network to connect and, where possible, align the learning processes across thematically related ULLs in different urban contexts through a central learning agenda. The meta-lab approach respects and supports local learning agendas and their focus on local solutions for local problems, while acknowledging and utilizing the potential of local experiments to contribute to a central learning agenda. Our paper argues that a meta-lab approach can act as a catalyst of learning in two important ways: (1) by accelerating local experimentation and learning processes by feeding them with lessons from other locations; and (2) by facilitating a more focused – local and transurban – learning process through a shared learning agenda. The meta-lab approach thus stimulates urban sustainability transformations by supporting faster, more focused and wider learning about effective innovations. We conclude this paper by outlining how common pitfalls in transurban learning can be avoided by a careful design of the meta-lab, or by meeting certain conditions when implementing this design.

A debate about emerging models of urban living labs (ULLs) 2.0 is taking place in the literature, highlighting the importance of social aspects. The aim of this paper is to examine feminist ULLs as a potential source of social sustainability. This is conducted through a case study of a feminist ULL in Sweden, where girls and young women, together with multiple professional stakeholders, used Minecraft to redesign a public square in their neighbourhood - a marginalised suburban area of Stockholm. Data was collected through participant observations of six experimental labs during 1 year, surveys of the ULL participants, and an analysis of the final Minecraft designs. The empirical findings reveal a process of mutual learning between girls and professional stakeholders, where the girls were viewed as place experts. The findings also reveal that the girls’ visions include a socially sustainable transition of the urban square: from patriarchal to inclusive, from grey to green, and from a transit area to a meeting-place. There were some differences between girls and professional stakeholders. Whereas the professionals tended to emphasise security in their visions, the girls emphasised liveability. Although more research is needed, this paper concludes that feminist ULLs can be a possible source of social sustainability. However, the ULL process must both be inclusive, and at the same time unlock long-term transformation in the physical environment.

The article attempts to synthesise existing knowledge and research related to the functioning of urban (living) labs and to analyse the particular experiences of their dozens of representatives from all over the world in order to develop a definition and model of an urban lab adapted to the conditions of Central and Eastern European countries. The lack of a systematised definition concerning functioning urban labs has influenced the development of a single, possibly precise definition of an urban lab, adapted to the socio-economic conditions of CEE countries. On the basis of a systematic review of the literature on the subject and a questionnaire survey of 24 urban labs from different countries of the world regarding their functioning, an attempt was made to develop an integrated model of an urban lab, taking into account elements such as stakeholder groups, thematic areas of activities, or stages of the design process, among others. The various definitions and typologies of urban (living) labs presented in this article, as well as the different approaches to their operation in many countries, indicate what an elaborate and heterogeneous tool they are. Despite the noticeable differences, their overarching goal of operation is invariably to improve the quality of life of city dwellers, taking into account the interests of different audiences. The growing interest in urban labs is reflected in the increasing number of publications on the subject of their functioning and the rising number of ”urban lab” initiatives, which influences the larger number of cities considering their implementation. So far, this tool has not been used in Central and Eastern European countries, including Poland, which led the authors of this study to develop the concept of an urban lab (2018/2019), based on which a pilot project was implemented in two Polish cities between 2019 and 2021.

Cities are at the forefront of the climate crisis, requiring innovative approaches to foster sustainability transformations. Urban Labs offer a promising avenue for engaging diverse stakeholders and driving transformative change, yet the role of mindset shifts of people involved in these processes remains underexplored. This article presents a longitudinal study of five Urban Labs in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico, examining how engagement in these participatory spaces can influence climate-related beliefs, perceptions and attitudes. Building on a multi-tiered analytical framework that combines quantitative survey data and qualitative interviews, we track the evolving mindsets of three stakeholder archetypes (personas)—Skeptical Activists, Optimist Technocrats and Bystanders with Mixed Feelings—over three transformation phases: Coalition building, visioning and co-design, and experimentation. Findings reveal that coalition building and co-design activities were particularly effective in fostering positive mindset shifts among Skeptical Activists and Bystanders, whereas experimentation resonated more with Optimist Technocrats. However, we also highlight the challenges of sustaining these changes in dynamic real-world settings. This research provides valuable lessons for researchers and practitioners seeking to design inclusive processes that build collective responsibility and resilience in addressing climate and related development challenges. Science Highlights Urban Labs catalyze climate change-related mindset shifts by involving diverse stakeholders in co-creating context-specific solutions. Dynamic personas reveal a non-linear evolution of mindsets and stakeholder engagement in Urban Labs across transformation phases. Coalition building, co-design and experimentation influence personas differently. Participant turnover in Urban Labs amplify mindset shifts and systemic change potential. Participatory traditions accelerate Urban Lab integration and shape mindset shift journeys; socio-economic barriers hinder progress.

Cities are essential players in responding to the present complex environmental and social challenges, such as climate change. The nature-based solution (NbS) concept is identified in the scientific discourse and further recognized by the European Commission as a part of the solution to address such challenges. Deploying NbS in urban contexts requires the cooperation of different public and private stakeholders to manage those processes. In this paper, the experiences of establishing and managing NbS-related processes following a co-creation approach in the city of Hamburg within the framework of an EU-funded research project (CLEVER Cities) are described and analyzed. The paper identifies and discusses the main emerging factors and challenges from (1) a procedural and methodological perspective and (2) concerning the different roles of the diverse stakeholders involved. This discussion is grounded in the context of existing regulations and novel concepts for citizens’ participation in urban decision-making processes. As research results, the article defines the leading players involved in the process and their roles and interrelationships, along with recommendations for future policy agendas in cities when dealing with NbS planning.

Urban labs are open innovation ecosystems, i.e. places, either promoted by companies or local institutions or spontaneously established by active citizens, wherein the current problems and challenges associated with a city are discussed and possibly innovative solutions are designed and implemented. Urban labs usually face complexity in managing the contributions of several heterogeneous actors. The paper presents the Urban Lab Methodology (ULM), which supports the management of urban labs by integrating Soft System Methodology with an open innovation framework previously developed by the authors. The former is a methodology to facilitate the structuration and solution of complex problems involving different stakeholders, whereas the latter aims at suggesting an association between the innovation context and the open innovation practices to be adopted. ULM is used to analyze the case study of Manifesto della Città Vecchia e del Mare (“The Old Town and Sea Manifesto”), a urban lab created in Taranto (Italy) in 2014. The analysis shows that theoretical prescriptions are to a great extent coherent with the real course of action and ULM is relatively easy to be adopted.