Production of creative spaces: Place-anchored networks in Shanghai’s design industries

As an emerging global city, Shanghai has experienced significant growth in its creative economy over the past two decades. By reconstructing a large number of old constructions into creative industry clusters, Shanghai has attracted a significant number of creative talents from across the globe. Informed by the theoretical discourse on the social network- based understanding of the production of creative spaces, this paper engages in a semi-structured interview analysis to shed light on the formation mechanism of place-anchored networks in Shanghai’s design industries. Creative spaces for the design industry in Shanghai are largely concentrated in inner-city areas and consist of six functional types: design enterprises or studios, arts and creative parks, educational institutions, exhibition centres, social networking spaces, and cultural and business areas. These multi-layered creative spaces are formed through intensive social interactions, knowledge spillovers, and functional complementation among creative designers and institutions. Finally, the implications of place-anchored networks for creative industries are discussed within the context of the planning and design of creative cities.