The study starts from understanding how tourists of Nordic & Baltic cities design their own experiences, and how they experience these cities. In total some 5,000 visiting tourists are being interviewed. The results are used to improve the design of tourist experiences in cities — taking into account the existing characteristics for each city — and to help cities meet the expectations and behaviours of their tourists.

“The introduction of experience design to the tourism, service and experience economy is new. Thus, ‘experience design’ will be analysed in order to arrive at a conceptual and practical understanding of how experiences are designed, communicated and constructed by producers as well as consumers.

‘Experience Design in City Tourism’ will provide fourteen cities in the five Nordic and three Baltic countries with valuable input for how to improve the tourism experiences. The analysis will also give Nordic and Baltic countries knowledge, inspiration and tools for how to analyse, understand, improve, customise and develop the user experience through the use of design in relation to experiences.”

The project is headed by Wonderful Copenhagen, the official Copenhagen tourist organisation. The other participants are Malmö, Arhus, Uppsala, Stockholm, Bergen, Oslo, Turku, Tampere, Helsinki, Reykjavik, Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius. The project is financed by the Nordic Innovation Centre under the auspices of the Nordic Council of Ministers. The results of the survey will be published during the spring of 2008.

Other related projects and studies on the Nordic Innovation Centre website:

• Jenka – creative industries or experience economy network
• The image of the city: urban branding as constructed capabilities in Nordic city regions
• Norden – a creative powerhouse