March 2016 for Arts Council Wales and Voluntary Arts

Interactive map for Get Creative

The UK’s biggest celebration of have-a-go creativity

Get Creative is an annual festival which takes place across the UK to celebrate creativity and give people the opportunity to get involved in creative events or to share their own event. For a week in May, hundreds of organisations and community groups put on free events across the country.

Originally a collaboration between Arts Council Wales and the BBC when it launched in 2015, the project now involves all UK Arts Councils along with other organisations such as libraries and local authorities.

In 2016, Arts Council Wales asked us to develop a web app that accepts public submissions of events, but that then allows the Arts Council to have editorial control over the events, before publishing them on a map as ‘pins’ for the public to explore. We have carried on making incremental improvements to the site every year, primarily focussing on improving the event ‘lifecycle,’ from the public-facing event submission form, through the event administrator interface, to the published event on the map.

In 2021, with indoor venues being restricted due to Covid, the festival became Get Creative Outdoors, encouraging people to try something creative in the open air.