TeamPeople was selected by The United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) to build an experiential event to showcase “blockchain live test and simulation: solutions for women and girls in humanitarian settings” at their headquarters in New York City, based on a design created by UN Women. The objective of the design was to create a simulation lab that “stylistically simulates the reality experienced by women and girls in humanitarian contexts” and how blockchain can be used to aide them. The lab enabled guests to explore, in collaboration with private sector vendors, cutting edge technical solutions that hold potential for closing gender gaps in humanitarian actions.
UN Women framed the challenge this way:
We live in a world where crisis has become the new normal. New approaches to humanitarian actions are needed to meet growing needs and to assist those left furthest behind. To help further these humanitarian actions, technology is being leveraged to provide opportunities to address these crises. UN Women, with the support of “Innovation Norway,” has begun investigating blockchain technology to empower women and girls in humanitarian settings. UN Women has identified two potential use cases to enable transformative change for women and girls:
- Send and receive digital assets directly
- (Re-) Build Civil and economic Identity
TeamPeople & Atomic Design
UN Women developed the concept and the design for the event. Working with UN Women’s design team, TeamPeople partnered with Atomic Design, a leading events and environment creator and builder for entertainment and brand communication, and found great solutions for executing UN Women’s design and to construct the environment for the event. UN Women’s design was to transform a floor typically reserved for conferences into a blockchain simulation lab. Atomic used its in house patented block technology to deliver over 35 blocks, printed with custom graphics, to simulate “blocks” in the welcome areas and throughout the exhibit, as per the design from UN Women. The blockchain lab itself was an area transformed into a maze designed to mimic the look of a refugee camp where the technologies would be put to work.
Project Management & Execution
TeamPeople provided the following personnel for the project:
- Ernie Crow – UN Relationship Manager
- Jon Bednar, CTS – Project Manager and AV Supervisor (TeamPeople)
- Project management
- AV Design and Installation
- Exhibit lighting Design and installation
- On-Site set construction
- 5 highly skilled engineers for set construction and strike
- On-site set construction and strike
- Set design assistance
Atomic provided two of their team members for set design and construction:
- Alix Renoylds – Project Manager and On-site Supervisor (Atomic)
- Taylor Jurell – Project Designer and On-site construction supervisor (Atomic)
The design of the Blockchain Simulation Lab was done by UN Women’s design team.
The team worked together flawlessly and in good collaboration with UN Women to achieve the goal of demonstrating cutting edge Blockchain technology solutions within a simulated refugee camp setting. The multi-day event was deemed a huge success by UN Women.
To learn more about the event, please see the UN Women press release.
To learn more about the work of UN Women, please visit them at http://www.unwomen.org.
