Creative West

In recent years there has been an array of maps about Western Sydney circulated on the internet—as social media memes, data visualisations or illustrations accompanying news stories—that reinforce our region’s perceived geographic, social, and economic distance from the rest of Sydney. In response to this, Creative West presents a different view of Western Sydney that includes an interactive map of local creative businesses and organisations, and a curated snapshot of what’s currently happening in the cultural space. It aims to contribute to ongoing conversations about culture in the west, particularly the impact, capacity, and potential of our localised creatives in the context of the unprecedented urban growth and development occurring in Western Sydney. Creative West is based on the findings of a doctoral research study that sought to identify the existence of and better understand the Design sector in Western Sydney. The data about designers shown on this map was updated in 2020 and augmented by other sites where culture is produced, learned, or experienced. This website is for the general public, particularly people who are interested in or involved with art and culture and would like to see what’s happening in Western Sydney, which has often been represented by the media as “uncultured”. It’s also a resource for teachers working with young creatives who could be inspired by knowing about creative people and places close to home, and for locals more broadly who might be tired of seeing our home turf presented in the usual light.