OUR CIRCLES / PROJECTS
Regeneration Festival
Together with Kenge Content Hive and the Samia community in Kenya, we explore how ancestral traditions of communal dialogue can connect generations and support community-led climate resilience and regeneration.
In collaboration with:
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Reawakening the spirit of communal dialogue
How can ancestral traditions help communities respond to the challenges of today and regenerate their futures? For generations, village barazas have brought communities together to share wisdom, resolve conflicts and make collective decisions. These gatherings connect generations and create space for different voices to be heard, yet opportunities for this kind of communal dialogue are changing.
The idea for the Regeneration Festival emerged during Dutch Design Week 2024, through conversations and collaboration with designers in the Netherlands. Together with our Kenyan partner Kenge Content Hive, we began exploring how the tradition of the baraza could inspire new ways of bringing people together around cultural continuity, climate resilience and ecological regeneration. What began as an idea developed into a series of opportunities for intergenerational exchange, bringing elders, young people, designers and community members together to share knowledge and imagine regenerative futures. At its heart, the festival seeks to reconnect ancestral wisdom with contemporary challenges, strengthening community relationships and creating space for locally rooted responses to the climate crisis.
How we gathered
Intergenerational dialogue at Bumbe Beach
We brought elders and young people together at Bumbe Beach for an intergenerational conversation about cultural knowledge, community life and the future. The gathering created space to share experiences, learn from one another and explore how ancestral wisdom can inform responses to contemporary challenges, including climate change. Representatives of local authorities and offices of culture also took part, connecting the conversation with local institutions and cultural leadership.
The online baraza
Building on these exchanges, we organized an online baraza to explore how traditional forms of communal dialogue could respond to contemporary challenges. The conversation opened up an important reflection: while barazas have long played a role in community decision-making, women and young people felt systematically excluded from these traditional spaces. This raised a fundamental question: how can we preserve the value of ancestral practices while making them more inclusive and ensuring that different voices can meaningfully contribute?
Developing a more inclusive baraza framework
In response to the insights from the online baraza, the team developed a new framework for intergenerational dialogue, reimagining how barazas could be organized and facilitated. The aim was to retain their value as spaces for communal exchange while introducing more inclusive practices that enable women and young people to participate and be heard. Grounded in Samia traditions, the framework connects cultural continuity with climate resilience, climate justice and regeneration, creating space for communities to draw on ancestral knowledge while collectively addressing today’s challenges.
The Regeneration Festival
The process culminated in the Regeneration Festival in Kenya at the end of 2025. Bringing the spirit of the baraza into a shared community gathering, the festival brought together elders and young people, alongside representatives of local authorities and offices of culture. It created opportunities to celebrate cultural heritage, exchange knowledge across generations and explore regenerative ways of living. The festival put the project’s evolving approach to communal dialogue into practice, recognizing ancestral wisdom as a living resource for strengthening communities and responding to ecological and social challenges.
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Do you want to support?
The Regeneration Festival is now being carried forward by our partners at Kenge Content Hive, who continue to develop this work with the Samia community. If you would like to support the festival and its mission to revive intergenerational dialogue, celebrate ancestral knowledge and foster community-led regeneration, visit the Kenge Content Hive website.
THE TEAM
Who makes it happen
STORIES AND NEWS
Stories about the project
The power of intergenerational conversations
Group picture after the workshop at Bumbe Cultural Centre. Photo by Obosh Pixels On 1st March 2025, a unique and significant gathering took place at Bumbe Cultural Centre in Busia. It brought together elders and youth from the Samia community, providing a platform to bridge the intergenerational gap and revive traditional knowledge. This event, organized […]
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