A City Portrait Canvas for Workshops
A workshop tool to evaluate strategies through the City Portrait’s ‘4 lenses’
Version 1.1 (March 2021)
* 下面也提供葡萄牙语（PDF) *
* Também disponível em português abaixo (PDF) *
Overview
The City Portrait Canvas is a workshop tool created by the Thriving Cities Initiative – a partnership between Doughnut Economics Action Lab, C40 Cities and Circle Economy. Changemakers can use this tool to foster big-picture thinking on how a particular city strategy may impact the world in which it is embedded, both socially and ecologically, locally and globally.
The Canvas is designed for strategic policy development and analysis in workshop settings. It applies the City Portrait’s ‘4 Lenses’ conceptual framework as a basis for participants to consider the many complex interconnections between a city’s local aspirations – to be thriving people in a thriving place – and its global responsibilities – to respect the wellbeing of all people and the health of the whole planet.
Why use it?
This is an easy-to-use and engaging workshop tool that is well-suited for small groups or breakout sessions (2–8 people per group) aiming to enhance the design of city strategies, policies and initiatives to meet 21st century challenges.
The tool is an integrated and ready-to-use set of resources (available as PDF in both A3 and A4 paper sizes) that includes:
- A blank ‘Canvas’ template of the 4 Lenses
- Step-by-step instructions
- Additional information and worksheets
Watch this 10-minute video for an illustrative example of how to use the City Portrait Canvas to create city strategies in a holistic way:
Acknowledgements
The City Portrait Canvas was created by Max Russell, Ilektra Kouloumpi, Vera Charniak, and Nicolas Raspail from Circle Economy, with contributions from Julia Lipton from C40, Kate Raworth and Andrew Fanning from DEAL.
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This tool is licensed under a Creative Commons BY SA 4.0 license. For full details visit our Licensing Rules. 
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Member
Luisa Marques
Porto, Norte, Portugal
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Member
David Barns
Leeds, England, United Kingdom
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Member
Johann Recordon
Lausanne, Vaud, Switzerland
Research collaborator at the Interdisciplinary Center for Sustainability, University of Lausanne. Originally trained as a project manager for tech innovation, I am finishing a master's degree in strong sustainability. My research interests lie mostly in how to effectuate a rapid, radical and just ecological transition. In parallel, I have also been a climate activist with Fridays for Future and independently studied Tibetan Buddhism.
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Member
Bjørn Hauger
Tønsberg, Vestfold, Norge
Bjørn Hauger (PhD) is a sociologist. He has worked at Vestfold University College in Norway and has also worked as a consultant. He has extensive experience with the use of the strength-based action research tradition Appreciative Inquiry (AI) as an approach to work with organizational development and change processes in the public sector. Hauger has written several publications on this topic.
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Member
Marina Stögner
Vienna
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Member
Steven Sostak
Beijing, 北京市, People's Republic of China
I'm the founder of Inspire Citizens, an educational organization that helps to design schools as thriving community centers of transformational learning. We work with our partners to envision education as a crucial pathway towards a more sustainable and equitable present and future.
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Martin Stavenhagen
Singapore, Singapore
Hi, I'm a Doughnut, circular economy and system innovation / net-zero enthusiast originally from Germany, in Singapore since 2014 . I'm also Co-Founder and Director of Get Circular with SD Consulting; and a policy consultant, coach and educator focused on building capacities for the circular economy and sustainable development.
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Member
Marian Turniawan
Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada
