Rather than building a community around a space, as many creative hubs, « third-places » do, the Tunisian initiative L’Blaça took a different approach to cooperation among stakeholders. Five organizations, already firmly rooted in their respective territories, with their own audiences, practices, and identities, chose to experiment with a different path: one of gradual cooperation, built on a shared foundation of values drawn from the social and solidarity economy.
“Unity is strength: at first, we wanted to create a space with cooking, crafts, culture etc. We were carrying out activities, but not with a collective mindset,” explains Rim Mathlouthi, president of the Tunisian Permaculture Association (ATP). Initially, these five associations, the ATP, the Collectif Créatif, Beity/Bahja, Shanti, and the Association Patrimoine pour l’Économie Solidaire (APES)/Ftartchi, cooperated informally without any structured collective approach. “Our initial goal wasn’t necessarily to have a physical space. What drove us was working together,” recalls Dhafer Ben Khalifa from the Collectif Créatif.
From a structure to an infrastructure: what Mawjaat changed
“Thanks to Mawjaat, we were able to gain perspective: we structured and rethought ourselves through this program. We moved from an intuitive dynamic to a more conscious approach, one able to name itself, tell its own story, and organize itself progressively. We truly entered a logic of collective organization,” says the ATP founder. The program gave them the opportunity to build a framework, an infrastructure that gradually took shape in a new location at 46 Rue du Niger, right next to the premises already occupied by several collective members. “The Mawjaat funding allowed us to create and rent a space, which we also use to host outside organizations that aren’t part of Blaça, such as Ideeyet, for example,” explains Rim Mathlouthi. A first event took place at 46 Rue du Niger on June 6th, where signage still being designed displayed a unified identity for the members, under the name “Nahj El Collectif” (نهج).
The first part of the funding also went toward creating SOGEMU (Société de Gestion des Espaces Mutualisés, or Shared Space Management Company), marking a concrete step toward shared governance: beyond simple space-rental management, it lays the groundwork for a common framework in which responsibilities, spaces, and collective time are beginning to be distinguished and negotiated, launching a genuine culture of resource-sharing. This progress is especially important for L’Blaça’s members, who plan to continue this governance work during the project’s second phase by clarifying coordination methods, responsibilities, and decision-making processes.
Now able to rely on a space and management tools, the collective is turning toward developing joint projects, as Dhafer Ben Khalifa explains: “We started thinking of the dynamic of a third-place as shared programming and a space for long-term structuring and creation: we asked ourselves how we could make the most of this resource-sharing, to the point of being able to present things together.”
Resource-sharing at the heart of programming
The first Mawjaat funding, amounting to 16 000€ between October 17, 2025 and April 30, 2026, made it possible to set up a series of events pooling the expertise of each organization in the collective, such as the Tunis Workshop “From Care to Collective Resilience,” led by L’Blaça members, which brought together Mawjaat program beneficiaries for two days in February 2026, as well as Les Échos Solidaires, an event held in November 2025 that combined professional sessions, panel discussions, stalls, and a market to test, in real conditions, the collective’s ability to produce joint, interdisciplinary programming.
“The activities we offer allow us to pool together very different audiences. The ATP tends to attract people from an agricultural background, the Collectif Créatif tends to attract designers and artists, Ftartchi attracts individuals in economically vulnerable situations etc. It’s a very interesting mix,” says Rim Mathlouthi enthusiastically.
The various associations in the collective integrate one another into their projects, each learning from the others’ expertise: from September 25 to 27, for instance, the ATP will invite L’Blaça members to lead workshops on food sovereignty and agriculture, while a mural will be created using recycled materials under the direction of the Collectif Créatif, and the cooking will be handled by Ftartchi.
The Mediterranean and ecology
Beyond bringing the stakeholders involved closer together and giving them structure, this network dynamic fosters an exchange of learning and practices whose most solid outcomes will take shape over the long term. It has nonetheless already succeeded in anchoring L’Blaça within a Mediterranean community of reflection and practice. “Mawjaat, for example, let us know that there are hybrid and « third » spaces in Lebanon and understand how they work. It’s a chance to meet people and dig deeper into what’s happening in other Mediterranean countries, which often experience realities similar to ours. Even if we’re not doing the same thing, looking at their economic model is very interesting for us.”
Unlike other organizations whose purpose is purely cultural, L’Blaça is a consortium of stakeholders working in different fields, ranging from the social and solidarity economy to care work, craftsmanship, social support, entrepreneurship, and territorial development. The resource-sharing work undertaken and supported by Mawjaat, along with regional exchanges around Mediterranean creative hubs, help create the conditions needed to develop activities linked to cultural and ecological transition. This was the case, for example, with the Saturday Markets set up every week by the Tunisian Permaculture Association, an example of action showing that agroecology can become a concrete consumption practice by connecting producers, urban consumers, sustainable food practices, and short supply chains. Likewise, the Les Chefs du Vivant event, organized by the ATP and Ftartchi in November 2025, highlighted cooking, food, and ecology, the organizers’ areas of expertise, in order to draw the connection between cooking and agroecological transition.
This is a complex, committed, and still-new approach, one intended to unfold over the long term, as Dhafer Ben Khalifa points out: “All of this takes time. Mawjaat’s flexibility is much appreciated. They trust the organizations they support. On the cultural side, for example, we’re going to start hosting residencies as early as next month, and set up monthly programming, taking turns among members.”
By Emmanuel Khoury, August 4th, 2026