The RECHARGE Living Labs are dynamic spaces where ideas and solutions can be co-created, tested, and iterated by collaborating stakeholders. The Living Lab offers methods for cultural heritage institutions, researchers, industry, communities, and government to co-design concrete solutions in real-life environments. Operating as 'innovation zones', Living Labs can bring together community knowledge with professional expertise for action-based projects.

The RECHARGE Living Labs aim to build new, long-term, sustainable participatory business models for the cultural heritage sector with a wide variety of participants. These models will be documented in a playbook for use by other cultural heritage institutions.

The first three RECHARGE Living Labs will be led by the Hunt Museum, Ireland, the Prato Textile Museum, Italy and the Maritime Museum, Estonia, working with local communities and partners, informed by the research and analytical skills of our academic partners.

After a successful RECHARGE NEXT campaign, we are proud to present here the six new institutions setting up the next generation RECHARGE Living Labs. The vetting process involved careful evaluation of each submission's quality, relevance, and originality. This ensured that the most promising contributions were selected, aligning with RECHARGE's goals and objectives.