Co-funded by the European Commission’s Creative Europe programme, Human Cities has in the past four years challenged the city scale with passion, determination and tenacity. It has been an exceptional learning opportunity for all partners involved in this international, intercultural and interdisciplinary network. We have learned about bottom-up initiatives across Europe through our state-of-the-art research. And we have learned from each other through the experiments. It has made us question our own cities. Are there transition spaces that can betransformed into places where people like to stay and meet, as the team in Graz did for Jakomini Street, and the team in Bilbao for the San Francisco neighbourhood? Does our city have empty squares that can be made into lively social spaces through culture and gamification, as in Milan and Ljubljana? Which neighbourhoods could we transform by creating new services, by working with makers and implementing ideas based on the circular economy, following the examples of London and Saint-Étienne? We have seen the value of experimentation as a tool. Experimentation is safe, it is reversible and can be reoriented. Failure is acceptable and leads each time to learning. It provides an opportunity for people to live through an exceptional situation they created themselves, and see what can be gained, for themselves and for others. Sharing its success enriches the community and invites further dialogue, leading to further projects.