Create West Virginia

After four years of grass roots creative community building, it's time to take it to the next level West Virginia!

Here's a brief presentation on how we'll do that together. What do you think?

This is the third year we've attempted to help West Virginia adopt a modern, entrepreneurial approach to economic development by emphasizing the growth of our "new" economy based on innovation.

(NOTE: Apologies for the poor formatting on this post, our blog site is having some issues)

You know how people have some relatives that you dont' really know that well, even though they don't live that far away? For whatever reason, you just never hung out with them much growing up.

Then one day, you actually take some time to get to know them. Maybe you hung out at a family reunion, or they took the initiative and reached out to invite you over. And they turn out to be really cool and you hit if off quite nicely.

For the seventy-five people or so who populated one of West Virginia's most high-tech buildings yesterday at the Create WV - Fairmont/Marion County Summit, the issue wasn't whether they wanted to grow their new economy, but what still needed to be done.

The third Create WV Conference came to a close on Tuesday with over 420 people experiencing the power of an emerging creative community - Huntington, WV. Special thanks to othe local Create Huntington team who put in countless hours and contributed valuable leadership and ideas.

Most often heard comment? "Wow...Huntington has changed a lot!"

Think creative community building principles are just neat ideas but lack tangible impact? Listen to these stories of West Virginia communities creating a more prosperous future for themselves: 

Glenville, WV 

The Create WV movement to foster creative communities for success in the new economy is only 18 months old, as dated by our first media event at the Clay Center in Charleston and launch of the Culture, Creativity and Innovation: West Virginia in the New Economy white paper back in July 2007.