Rhizome 2026: Open Session 02: Regenerative Futures & Fellowship
The second open session focused on the fellowship structure, application process, and featured presentations from Rhizome³ fellows sharing their narrative hacks and experiences in the programme.
Following a brief recap of Culture Hack Labs’ approach and the Culture Hack Method for those joining for the first time, three fellows from the previous cohort presented their projects and reflections.
Fuegas Collective (Argentina) — a feminist firefighting collective based in Córdoba, working at the intersection of gender justice and ecological crisis. Operating within community fire brigades in a context of democratic erosion and environmental precarity (Córdoba retains less than 2% of its native forest), the collective’s hack centred on challenging the militarised language dominant in firefighting culture, bringing tenderness, care, and feminist perspectives into fire response and community organising. Their narrative interventions included internal workshops and a public hack at Argentina’s national gathering for women and gender non-conforming people, attended by over 70,000 people.
Uma Uma Rainbow Collective (Kenya) — an African queer anarchist and abolitionist group based in Nairobi, working in the Economies of Regeneration pathway. Their hack challenged the dominant narrative that freedom for queer people requires either leaving the country or attaining financial escape from marginalisation. Through a cash-free “prize giving day” — a freedom market where participants offered skills, food, drinks, conversation, and care rather than money — the collective prototyped what a gift economy and community-based freedom could look like in practice. The event generated significant community interest in continuing gift economy models.
Hawaii Investment Ready / Aloha Economic Futures (Hawaiʻi) — a financial activism initiative working toward an economy grounded in care for land and community. Their hack, Vivicon, was a two-day cross-sector gathering bringing together 138 participants from 79 organisations across five islands — including community groups, funders, farmers, cultural practitioners, and government officials. Rather than a conference, it was designed as a space to test narrative frames, build shared language, and deepen relational infrastructure. Key insight from the fellowship: coalition building is the narrative work, not something separate from it.
The session closed with a walkthrough of the application process and fellowship agreements, covering attendance expectations, the co-lead requirement, pathway alignment, and the two core deliverables: a narrative hack prototype and a case study with self-defined impact metrics. The slides for this session can be found here.
Key Information:
- Application form open: March 26 – April 16, 2026
- Deadline to apply: April 16, 2026
- Shortlist interviews: last week of April (30-minute interviews)
- Final decisions: first week of May
- Fellowship begins: May 28, 2026
- Bi-weekly online sessions (Thursdays, 11:00–12:30 Mexico City time): May 28, Jun 11, Jun 25, Jul 9, Jul 23, Aug 6, Aug 20, Sep 3, Sep 17, Oct 1, Nov 5, Nov 19, Dec 3, Dec 17 (14 sessions total)
- Mandatory in-person gathering in Costa Rica: October 22–28
- Hacking & implementation phase: November–December
- Final deliverables: January 2027
- Maximum 20 projects selected (4 per pathway)
- Teams of at least 2 people (co-lead) required
- No cost to participants
- Contact: rhizome@culturehack.io