About Activated Spaces

As part of the Greater Downtown Dayton Plan, the Downtown Dayton Partnership is working with two local young professional groups, Generation Dayton and updayton, on the Activated Spaces project. This project aims to give new life to vacant street-level commercial space, particularly for arts and cultural purposes.  The project goals are to:

  • Re-activate and beautify vacant storefronts with creative display
  • Encourage entrepreneurs, artists and community groups to occupy space for short- and long-term use
  • Showcase downtown properties and increase interest and investment in available downtown space

The project would directly impact the downtown neighborhood in a positive and vibrant way. The project kicked off with an open competition for artists to fill storefront windows with art based on the theme of “Celebrating Dayton.” The artwork was installed by project volunteers and officially launched on May 13′s Urban Nights. The team plans to host more themed art competitions periodically so the displays will rotate with fresh and exciting artwork. Other initiatives will create a pop-up retail shop and partner with area colleges to create an engaging learning exercise for business students. The ultimate goal, which will be part of the third initiative, will spur the growth of more downtown businesses, making the greater Dayton region an economically strong and culturally vibrant community.

All three initiatives are being led by enthusiastic volunteers who recognize the value in having a vibrant and creative downtown. They are dedicated to seeing these projects come to fruition and the clear success of the storefront art competition demonstrates their commitment.