The Tapestry Project

Weaving the People, Projects, and Resources to Enhance Connection and Scale Impact

There is urgency from all communities to find answers: "Who is here? What projects are being worked on by those in this community? Where might there be opportunities for collaboration, especially because it seems like more than one person is working on the same thing? How can we discover the synergies more quickly?" In essence, people want to share their expertise and their projects, people need to see the whole community more clearly to be able to choose where they fit, and we all need to speed this up to use resources more wisely and scale the great work that is already happening.

Existing solutions are often maps that are curated by only a few people and cannot be edited by all members and so quickly become high-maintenance or fall out-of-date. It's obvious this isn't scalable or sustainable.

So until we have the technological innovation to accomplish our ideal maps, the Tapestry Project was designed to fill the void in the interim. Tapestry view offers a simple X / Y axis, spreading out all the pieces so we can get a good look and it is editable by every member of the community.

“Pull a thread here and you’ll find it’s attached to the rest of the world.”

~ Nadeem Aslam, The Wasted Vigil

The Struggle

We are all working to create something completely new and that requires a shift in every system. It’s like working together on a 1000-piece puzzle with no picture as a reference and with no obvious edges or corners. We know we have pieces, but not only do we have to find them, once we do, we have no idea where they go! Occasionally we run into others, and if we're lucky, the pieces might have similar colors. If the fates are with us, two pieces might actually fit together. Then again, maybe not. We can't be sure.

The Solution

If we provide a grid, a framework, to help guide pieces of the puzzle into the right general area, then that greatly increases the chances that we find complementary efforts. The faster the connections get made, the sooner new synergies are found. With the synergies, individual pieces become threads in the Tapestry.

The act of weaving can begin and an image of the community starts to emerge more clearly. A flower here, a fence there, a tree and a strawberry. The image transforms the community, reducing friction to action, and increasing flexibility, choice and engagement. Excitement builds over the possibilities of what could come next.

Using Catalist Network

Tapestry View - Transformative Impact Summit.png

For events:
Transformative Impact Summit

This public Trove on the Catalist Network provides people with a respository of the people, presentations and resources that were curated during an event. Adding the Tapestry view distributes the objects among the SDGs to allow everyone to see alignments and the gaps and enables members to find each other and network according to shared interests and efforts.

For Curation & Sharing:
Regenerative Agriculture Resources

This public Trove on the Catalist Network provides members with a way to curate resources, add comments and build common understanding. Adding the Tapestry view allows people to easily see what type of resources are available based on the ontology chosen by the editors - in this case, societal sectors. This encourages the community to add more objects, find what they need, explore new resources, and share with their wider network.