The Green Workshop Wendland

The Green Workshop Wendland is a Think Tank!

It connects young, creative people with regional business partners in workshops and design camps. Interdisciplinary groups work on sustainable concepts, processes and innovative product ideas. The concepts and sketches that result are then are given to students as one of their first projects.

Here, students can become familiar with Wendland and medium-sized businesses and local companies make connections to universities and potential recruitments and find out about new developments. Secondarily, the participants discover regional potential and become familiar with the area as a place to live and work.

The Green Workshop Wendland opens up doors, creates new bonds and organises the exchange between the different partners. The Green Workshop Wendland cooperates with the county of Lüchow-Dannenberg as a sponsor and with many professors from ten different universities and regional companies.

Here is an example:
Young design and traditional craftsmanship was the motto of our camp from 11-18 September 2016. Young designers and established craftsmen and women put their heads together to develop ideas for products and concepts that present special recognisability for the region and its natural and cultural landscapes. The goal is to strengthen ecologically sound and sustainable management in the UNESCO biosphere reserve with innovative concepts, services and products.

The willow tree is a good example of ecologically friendly management to show what this can actually look like in practice. Caring for the cultural willow tree demands an incredible amount of work over the year that is usually done by nature conservation associations. The “harvested” willow rods are usually thrown away. If you can find a new way to use the willow rods, then there would be an increased demand for them and the yearly care of the willow tree would become an economic given.

Further workshop content were also resource saving concepts and ideas for reusing regionally produced waste material.

By connecting craftspeople and designers, the Green Workshop Wendland hopes to initiate cooperations that produce good ideas for the implementation of sustainable products. With a new policy, the local government also supports ecologically friendly sustainable management in the reserves.

The Green Workshop Wendland organises excursions

Students and their teachers come to Wendland because it is a good place to work and gain experience, while having the concentration and stimulus to work on topics for the semester. The Green Workshop Wendland offers many realistic examples of sustainable topics and connects the students with local companies and specialists.
There is a very diverse range of prepared issues from regional companies and institutions just waiting to be used for semester projects either in the design camp or for individual final theses. Start-ups are looking for the right partner to help them implement their sustainable product or service idea. The Green Workshop Wendland facilitates the necessary contacts within the company network in Wendland.

Here is a current example:
The Master’s programme for Sustainable Management at the Leuphana University of Lüneburg ends with a workshop in which the students have to prove the knowledge they have gained during their degree programme.

This year, the Green Workshop Wendland is the cooperation partner for this concluding workshop and took care of the planning and organisation around the workshop, it also has a say in the content of the final exam.

Today, the Kreativlabor Alte Post, or Creative Laboratory Alte Post, in Lüchow is a co-working space that serves as the centre of the Green Workshop Wendland. The beautiful building serves as the Workshop’s office. This is a place where culture and education can crystallise as important location factors and where a network can be formed of young, experienced creative thinkers from the area and the surrounding metropolis. The goal is to work on generating added value in the region, either together in a group or on one’s own project.
Here there are offices with good internet connections everyone can use, meeting rooms and dorms and soon there will be a workshop with a 3D printer. Workshops, networking and informative events take place in the Kreativlabor Alte Post Lüchow. The people who use this space can request expert consultation from our cooperation partners, such as the office for economic development, the Chamber of Industry and Commerce or the Chamber of Trade.

The project is sponsored as a multi-functional house by the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture by way of a German Bundestag resolution.