RMIT City North Shared Futures Festival 2026

03 Oct 2026
11:00am - 04:00pm
FREE
RMIT City North Social Innovation Precinct: Cardigan Street, Carlton VIC 3053

RMIT City North Shared Futures Festival returns to Cardigan Street on Saturday 3 October for a free day of creativity, community and discovery. Explore food, performances, workshops, technology, design, urban growing and hands-on activities for all ages, and experience the City North Social Innovation Precinct as a living lab in action.

Save the date! City North Shared Futures Festival returns for its third year, bringing Cardigan Street to life with creativity, community, food, performances and hands-on experiences.

On Saturday 3 October, RMIT students and staff will join local communities, partners, artists and organisations for a free day of making, playing, learning and exploring within RMIT's City North Social Innovation Precinct. Everyone is welcome.

What's on

There'll be plenty to see, taste, make and experience throughout the day, with activities for all ages.

Walking Together: A Cardigan Street 'Civic Gym'

Journey along Cardigan Street and explore the stories, people and ideas shaping the City North Social Innovation Precinct. Pick up your Civic Gym Pass and follow the trail to discover, contribute and imagine what could come next.

Frugal Canteen

The Frugal Canteen is back! Serving affordable meals made by the community for the community.

Enjoy cheese toasties, neighbourhood wings, future fries, Zimbabwean home-grown greens, Indonesian dishes and wild-fermented drinks. There is something to try, share and enjoy.

Come along for a meal, meet other people and spend time together. The Frugal Canteen is a welcoming place to sit, talk and connect with the community.

Whether you are looking for a quick, low-cost meal or want to try something new, drop by and see what is on the menu.

Everyone is welcome. Come hungry and stay for a chat!

Play about Place

See the precinct become a playground through place-based installations created by RMIT School of Design students. Encounter, interact with and help shape their ideas for civic participation as they're tested with the public.

Pavement Print Studio

Get hands-on with letterpress printing and create your own postcard using unique 3D-printed typefaces. Choose your words, set the type, ink the press and pull your own print.

Reciprocity and Regeneration: Lessons from the Murnong

Come listen, yarn and learn with First Peoples about regenerative practices they have developed on these lands over millennia. Join the RMIT School of Art community in reimagining trade in regenerative ways, through an exchange of surplus art materials including books, canvas, clay, paint, pencils and paper. Stay on and make artworks reflecting on Country with First Peoples artists Vicki Couzens (Keerray Wooroong and Gunditjmara), Brooke Wandin (Wurundjeri), Dominic White (Palawa) and friends, including pompom murnong flowers and a large-scale woven dilly bag.

Stories of Community, Culture and Belonging

Gather around a traditional Somali nomadic hut, or aqal, created by artist Muhubo Sulieman. Hear the story behind her craft and journey in Melbourne and contribute your own through weaving, mapping and postcards.

Urban Garden Pop-Up

Explore vertical growing towers filled with seasonal produce and discover an emerging RMIT pilot investigating how urban food growing could support more local, sustainable and connected food systems.

City North Futures: Architectural Film Screening

Experience imagined futures for the City North Social Innovation Precinct through an immersive short film created by RMIT Master of Architecture students using gaming environments, simulations and cinematic storytelling.

2035 Battery Negotiations

It's 2035 and Australia is drowning in dead EV batteries. Take on the role of a household, recycler, manufacturer, policymaker or community advocate and negotiate solutions to one of the energy transition's biggest challenges.

Learn more and register

City of Melbourne Pop-Up

Drop by for games, activities and a chat with local Neighbourhood Partners. Discover local grants, programs and opportunities and share your ideas for the neighbourhood.

Connect the Dot: A Participatory Public Artwork

Connect the Dots splashes colour across the buildings of City North. Shaped by RMIT student Sophie Stavrakis's own experience, Connect the Dots reveals some of the hidden stories unfolding within these buildings. Let the yellow dots lead you astray. Grab your own personal viewfinder and go exploring! There's no start or finish, just your personal trajectory as you connect the dots...

Make, Play, Design: An Open-Air Living Room

Step inside RMIT’s Industrial Design studio and experience design in action. Make, play and experiment alongside Industrial Design students as you test prototypes, try an interactive digital game, watch a 3D printer in action, contribute to a drawing wall or play with a large-scale interactive artwork. You can also jump into a 20-minute Mini Design Sprint with a table of strangers and put your ideas to the test. No design experience needed, just bring your curiosity!

RMIT Student Clubs

Meet RMIT student clubs and try engineering challenges, Women in STEM trivia, technology puzzles and Philosophy Hot Takes, plus catch live performances from RMIT's Funkadelics.

Magic Makeup World

Add some colour to your day with professional face painting for children and adults, from favourite characters and superheroes to colourful and completely imagined designs.

Magic Makeup World between 12pm–3pm

Hydrogen Mobility Experience with Toyota

Discover a new era of mobility with Toyota’s hydrogen-powered vehicles. Step aboard the SORA hydrogen fuel cell electric bus and get up close with the second-generation Mirai passenger car! Explore how hydrogen can be turned into electricity to power zero tailpipe-emission transport and support the future of mobility.

Meet & Greet: Haku the Robot

Meet Haku, the humanoid Pepper robot who loves to chat, share knowledge and even dance! Playful and engaging, he brings robotics to life for children and adults alike.

Meet & Greets between 12:30pm–3:30pm.

Indigenous Language and Ecology Walking Tour

Free walking tours through the regenerative neighbourhood of City North. Join a walking tour to learn Boonwurrung language with community linguist Alison Soutar and learn about urban greening with Gio Fitzpatrick from the Yalukit Willam Nature Reserve.

Created in consultation with N’arweet Professor Carolyn Briggs AM.

Tour times: 1–2pm & 3–4pm.

Hapa Zome Flower Hammering Workshops

Come join RMIT's School of Fashion & Textiles and try your hand at 'Hapa Zome', a natural printing technique where you pound fresh leaves and flowers onto fabric or paper to release their natural pigments.

This is a simple, seasonal activity for adults and children alike. Start hammering and take away your own spring design on fabric!

Live Performances

Live performances on the City North Shared Futures stage will include DJ sets by Andrew88 and Small Fry, as well as dance performances by the Funkadelics (RMIT's own student dance group).

DJ Andrew 88: Andrew 88 brings an adventurous ear and a knack for finding the perfect track to lift your day. Expect a carefully selected set full of character, curiosity and great sounds. @andrew88music

DJ Small FRY: Small FRY is the host of Mooncake on Triple R 102.7FM, celebrating sounds from Asia and artists of the Asian diaspora. She is also a co-founder of Big Bao, a collective that curates parties and events, and has performed at festivals including Meredith Music Festival, Art Basel Hong Kong and Asia TOPA. @smallfryhq

Community Leadership for Regenerative Placemaking: Urban Roleplay

What will Naarm/Melbourne look like in 2050 – and how will we live well together through a changing climate?

Step into City North and watch a live, interactive vision of the future unfold right across the festival!

Follow or interact with 16 community leaders as they move through festival sites – including the RMIT Playful Parklet and future play lab – using urban roleplay, Indigenous knowledges, and local expertise to prototype a better world.

Jump in as a reworlder, disruptor, or bystander, share your local insight, and test their speculative designs on the spot. It’s hands-on, creative placekeeping in action!

Hired by the Trees

What if the trees of the City North Precinct could hire you for the day?

Look out for a small van parked along Cardigan Street. It’s working for the trees!

Hired by the Trees is a playful pop-up experiment from the RMIT Regenerative Futures Institute, inviting you to slow down and experience the urban trees around us in a new way.

Pick up a task from the van, head out to complete your mission, then return and report back.

Your reward? A voucher to spend at a local store.

Find the van. Get hired. Help the trees

Experience the precinct as a living lab

The festival brings RMIT's City North Social Innovation Precinct to life as a living lab, where students, researchers, staff, community, industry and government come together to test ideas, build connections and explore new approaches to social and urban challenges.

Come for an activity, stay for lunch or spend the afternoon exploring. Bring your colleagues, classmates, friends or family and experience the City North Social Innovation Precinct in action.

Getting here

The City North Shared Futures Festival takes place along Cardigan Street in RMIT's City North Social Innovation Precinct, within easy reach of Melbourne's CBD.

By train: State Library Station and Melbourne Central Station are the closest stations, with the precinct a short walk away.
By tram: Swanston Street is serviced by tram routes 1, 3, 5, 6, 16, 64, 67 and 72. La Trobe Street is also serviced by routes 30 and 35, providing easy access to the RMIT City campus.
By car: Parking is available at RMIT's City Campus car park at Building 91, 110 Victoria Street, with entry via Cardigan Street. The car park is open 6.30am to 10pm, seven days a week. Weekend parking is $8.

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Acknowledgement of Country

RMIT University acknowledges the people of the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language groups of the eastern Kulin Nation on whose unceded lands we conduct the business of the University. RMIT University respectfully acknowledges their Ancestors and Elders, past and present. RMIT also acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and their Ancestors of the lands and waters across Australia where we conduct our business - Artwork 'Sentient' by Hollie Johnson, Gunaikurnai and Monero Ngarigo.

Learn more about our commitment to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples