Heritage Understanding & Participation Hackathon: Co-creating Cultural Heritage Experiences with and for youth (Hup Hackathon)

Heritage Understand and Participation (HUP) Hackathon is a unique pan-European project designed to create new blueprints for emotional engagement with heritage among young people aged 10-16 at museums and heritage sites.

The challenge – Inspired by the lived experiences of the consortium’s cultural operators and reflected in literature and Eurostat data, museum visits and deep engagement by youth, especially those outside the white, middle-class mainstream—are declining. Few digital-native teens reach deeper engagement where empathy and critical reflection spark change. Since affect, not information, drives impact, museums must shift from “”talking at”” to “”creating with”” young people.

The objective – Through this project, we question how the sector can give authorship to youth, framing heritage as an emotion and participatory practice that results in imagining how human–technology interplay can reshape heritage experiences, and foster emotional connections with generation alpha.

The solution – HUP blends value-based heritage interpretation with child-led design thinking and AI prototyping into a one-day hackathon. Five pilot museums (NL, BE, SI, PT, GR) will train staff, run hackathons with 60 diverse teens and build five low-cost prototypes. Outputs include an open manual, training materials, video tutorials and an online community facilitator network.

The impact – Youth gain belonging and empathy; professionals acquire a repeatable, inclusive method; society benefits from more relevant, participatory heritage spaces. A sustainability plan and the Global Children’s Designathon network have the potential to extend HUP across Europe and into 56+ countries—supporting, among others, post-war heritage recovery in Ukraine.

HUP Hackathon directly advances Creative Europe’s goals on innovation, inclusion and digital transition.

[Source: portal F&TOP]

Development Agency Kozjansko

(Partner) Šentjur

All projects of Slovenian producer

Foreign producers in the supported project

Stichting Designathon Works (leader)

Netherlands (EU)
Change Of Course (partner)

Belgium (EU)
EduQuest: (partner)

Greece (EU)
Fundação EDP (partner)

Portugal (EU)
Stad Kortrijk (partner)

Belgium (EU)
Stichting Het Nieuwe Instituut (partner)

Netherlands (EU)

Funded projects

stART point - a platform where performing arts and young people get connected (stART.)

Heritage Understanding & Participation Hackathon: Co-creating Cultural Heritage Experiences with and for youth (Hup Hackathon)

Artificial Intelligence for Artistic Futures and Creative Talents (ARTIFACT)

CULTIVATOR

Architecture With an Approach to Regeneration and Empowerment (AWARE)

Upsala – SUITCASES

Invisible painting (IP)

Building, Revising, Including - Diaspora and Gender Equality (BRIDGE)

Studio Virc – Mini Slate 2025: Izzvenelo bo, Dolasilla, princesa usode, Tujek, Pobeglo srce

NOSOROGI – Mini Slate 2025: Three Waters Meet, The Healers, Liar, Thief, Flea-Eater

Mono O – Mini Slate 2025: The Happiest Day, The Last Roast, After Sunday

Cvinger – Mini Slate 2024: Before the Eyes Turn Black, Reckoning by the Sea, Project North

Venice Eastern Gate

ECHOES from Invisible Landscapes

PORT OF DREAMERS

ACuTe: Culture Testbeds for Interactivity, Performance and Technology

Rail2Dance (Rail to Dance)

Innovation through media collaboration: Digital assets exchange platform (MEDEXCHANGE24)

Animation HUB (A-HUB)

Word: Enhancing European Graphic Novel Perception, Circulation and Market Development

Roma Soul Food (ROMASOUL)

Tying the European Cultural Landscapes with Knots and Patterns (Knots and Patterns)

Hiking Heritage Trails (INHERIT)

Sensory Artistic Experiences for the Blind (Multisensory Art)

PASS – Pass the Street (Art), Shake the Hand

Slow Performing Arts Festivals for Improved Wellbeing, Mental Health and Social Inclusion (Festival SPA)

Staragara – Slate 2024 (The Colour of the Doubt, Black Swan, Removal, We would have told each other everything, Kozmonavti)

PAGE: Project for Advancing coGnitivE accessibility in publishing

NEB COOLTOURS: Transforming Tourism Through Cultural Innovation and Environmental Stewardship in Alpe-Adria

Bridges

Transition to 8: European societies in flux

ENACT – Easy-to-understand News for Collaborative Transformation

THRIVE – Talent Harvest: Rural Intangible Heritage and Value Empowerment

Land of Lace

CAFE: Redefining Historic Cafés as European Cultural Heritage

ArtElevate – Fostering Inclusive Cultural Expression in Europe

CARE – Culture for Mental Health

Glassmaking Between Tradition and Innovation (GTMI)

WONDERCUT – Collaboratively Exploring the Public Value of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to Next Level Cultural Experiences

Heroes Unleashed: Implementing a Sensory Reading Program in European Public Libraries (HERUN)

DATAS – The Data and the Sovereign

TALKING HEADS – Conversation with the art of the past

Libraries of Emotions for Good – LOE for Good

GreenHeritage – Nurturing a sustainable future in the gardens of time

G-BOOK 3 – Audience engagement activities for the social and emotional education of EU teens through gender-positive literature and digital technology

DIGITAL on STAGE – Unleashing the Performing Arts Experience through Digital Innovation

OASis – Open Art Spaces in Synergy

Transport: Sustainable puppet co-creations for European young audiences

Danube Dance Alliance for Development of Contemporary Dance Scene in the Danube Region

Mind the GAP

Beletrina Digital

WOMEN interACT – participatory theatre against the double exclusion of women

TECH(ing) TALES WITH A TWIST for the children of the present

DoSEL – Drama of Smaller European Languages

MUSICVILLE – Green European Opera

Operation Nova - OPE.N

Kino x Games

FASIH - Future Art and Science Industrial Heritage

CULTURAL BEES: Promotion of entrepreneurship skills in the Cultural and Creative Industry among youth

Is this us?

Climate Art Fusion Caravane (CARAVANE)

Moving Balkans

Youth Art for the Earth (YAFE)

Shadow Pandemic: Hidden Voices

Open House Europe (OHEu)

Third Stage

VERSOPOLIS – WHERE POETRY LIVES

December: Uncomfortable Beings, Azra, Best Imaginary Friends Forever

LINA - Learn, Interact, and Network in Architecture

reCITYing – Reactivating Unused Urban Spaces Through Architecture and Arts 2024–2028

Art Nouveau: a new EUtopia

Creative Industries Development Centre (KUL)

Web 3.0 Accelerator for Sustainable Cultural Tourism (Web3Tour)

Studiotopia: Enter the Symbiocene with Arts and Science (Studiotopia 2)

Bio Awakening - developing bio-art practices in Western Balkan (Bio Awaking)

TestArt

GREENSTAGE

Connecting Emerging Literary Artists (CELA)

Transmedia stories of insularity (TRAST)