2020 CREATIVE SPACE SURVEY NOW OPEN
The Creative Space Survey is your platform to share your needs for creative space with the City of Austin.
Conducted annually by the Economic Development Department, the Creative Space Survey asks artists, arts organizations and businesses to share their space needs, preferences, and ideal costs. The information you share below allows Economic Development to keep pace with changing needs within our creative sector and directly informs department efforts for addressing affordability for local creatives such as creative space incentives, district designation, and creative space matchmaking efforts with partner organizations. The data you submit not only helps City staff develop new strategies, but is also available to the public and provides arts organizations with concrete information to support advocacy efforts and funding requests.
Take the 10 minute survey below to tell us what kind of space you need to keep you creating!
2017 CREATIVE SPACE SURVEY RESULTS
We are pleased to release results of the 2017 Creative Space Survey! The survey had over 500 respondents, and not surprisingly, results showed that artists are struggling to find affordable space to work and perform. Administered July–September of 2017, the survey revealed several broad trends within Austin’s creative sector:
Artists and organizations are looking for small to mid-sized spaces to grow
- 81% of artists polled indicated their ideal workspace to be 500 square feet or less
- 78% of organizations and businesses currently have space under 5,000 square feet, with 39% currently operating in small spaces under 1,000 square feet
- 51% of organizations and businesses said their space was currently too small
- 47% of organizations and businesses said their ideal space would be 1,000-5,000 square feet
Artists and Creative Spaces are finding it hard to stay in Austin
- 38% of respondents indicated they have paid for space they could not afford
- 69% used a space they identified as not being ideal for their needs
- 51% of artists surveyed said they have considered leaving Austin for another city or state
- 23% of organizations and businesses are in a precarious position with month to month leases
- 12% of organizations and businesses shared that they currently do not have or are in immediate danger of losing the space they need within the next year
Flex Spaces/Black Box Theaters and Classroom space are popular space requests
When organizations and businesses were asked to identify what their ideal space would include:
- 49% indicated flexible performance space and black box theaters
- 52% asked for classrooms and teaching space
- 34% were interested in workspaces for individual artists
Visit the Open Data Portal for complete survey results:
View results from the 2017 Artists Creative Space Survey.
View results from the 2017 Organizations and Businesses Creative Space Survey.
