Last night, we welcomed 200 guests at London’s Sky Garden to officially launch Imagination Matters.

This new global campaign, powered by the Institute of Imagination, calls upon influencers around the world to promote why imagination is essential for humanity to thrive in the 21^st century.

Ric Lewis, Chair of the Institute of Imagination, spoke at the event:

“New ideas and great innovation always start with a leap of imagination. As we move beyond the Information Age towards an uncertain but exciting future, we need those sparks of imagination more than ever.

“Despite this, imagination has been neglected or mistaken as a childish indulgence for too long and people in their working lives are not using this powerful asset as much as they could or should be.”

The campaign invites contributions to a new website, imaginationmatters.org, to spark debate around 9 themes; Learning and Play, Flourishing, Future Work, Empathy, Places to Imagine, Rapid Change, Making, Human and Next Generation. Each theme has an Imaginator who will champion and respond to the theme.

We were delighted to welcome one of our Imaginators to the event, presenter and former Principal at The Royal Ballet, Darcey Bussell, who joins us to champion the theme of Empathy.

She joins iOi Patron and Imaginator for Learning and Play, Sir Ken Robinson, who spoke at the event via live link from LA; actor and founder of Mindup Goldie Hawn who is Imaginator for Flourishing; Bethany Koby founder of Technology Will Save Us who will champion the theme of Making; Entrepreneur Rohan Silva for Future Work and Senior Vice President, Global Marketing for Unilever Aline Santos leading on Rapid Change. We’ll be announcing more exciting Imaginators over the coming months

You can read a range of fascinating articles written exclusively for imaginationmatters.org, including articles by founder of the School in the Cloud Sugata Mitra and Associate Director for the Global Education Innovation Initiative Dr Connie K. Chung. We look forward to sharing further responses to Imagination Matters from contributors as diverse as award-winning musician Hans Zimmer, Artist Mark Wallinger, Educationalist Andy Hargreaves and founder of Mindsight Institute Dan Siegel.

Gareth Binns, Chief Executive of the Institute of Imagination, said of the evening:

“It was a great pleasure to welcome so many supporters, Imaginators, contributors, and enthusiasts to discuss and highlight the power of imagination and its importance in our daily lives.

As we look towards next year, when we will be making an exciting announcement about the Institute of Imagination’s permanent Campus, this could not be a more important time to spark debate and raise awareness of the vital role imagination plays for everyone.”

Imagination Matters is designed to be truly collaborative, and we invite you to join the debate! You can share why imagination matters to you using #ImaginationMatters, suggest an article or contribute your owns thoughts via the website imaginationmatters.org