Dance-O-Mat

With all the empty spaces around Christchurch from buildings being demolished a "creative urban regeneration initiative" has been set up to make use of some of them.

Gap Filler aims to temporarily activate vacant sites within Christchurch with creative projects, to make for a more interesting, dynamic and vibrant city. Site-specific projects can help us celebrate, mourn and criticise all that we’ve lost; can help us play, experiment and toy with ideas for the future; can make otherwise empty areas active; and can ultimately pave the way in the revitalisation of the city.

Some of the projects include a book exchange, a giant chess set, bicycle-powered cinema, and the Dance-O-Mat which was in use when I went into the city last Saturday.

The Dance-O-Mat is a dance floor with coin operated sound and lighting courtesy of a converted washing machine, and anyone can use it as long as they have an mp3 player to plug in to the system. It looks like so much fun!