What would you present if you had five minutes and could use 20 slides? Community members took up this challenge on Saturday, Feb. 20 for the second PechaKucha night in St. Louis.

PechaKucha is a simple, concise presentation format in which 20 images chosen by the speaker are shown, each for 20 seconds. The images move forward automatically while the presenters talk. On this particular Saturday, the participants ranged from the president of Shaw neighborhood’s Bicycle Works to a plastic surgeon who recently returned from Haiti.

PechaKucha began in Tokyo (the name derives from the Japanese term for the sound of "chit chat") as a way for designers to meet, network and show their work. It now has spread to 280 cities worldwide.

Photos by Geoff Story

Stefene Russell (above) and Phil Valko (below) were among the presenters.

In St. Louis, PechaKucha attracted Stefene Russell, writer, blogger and editor to explore the plants and animals of her neighborhood and portray Old North as an attractive wildlife sanctuary. Russell added quirky lines to accompany her slides and had the crowd laughing at her unique perspective of Old North’s wildlife, which included a slide that showed a dog saved by Stray Rescue, another of a spider on her windowsill and strawberries continuing to grow through the urban trample.

Andrew Faulkner and Paul Hohmann took the stage together to promote City to River, an organization that is promoting a relocation of I-70. Mr. Faulkner’s dream is to one day have a picnic lunch by the Arch and then be able to walk to Busch Stadium for an evening game. (Read a Beacon Feed post for more information about this group.)

Phil Valko spoke about Urban Studio Cafe, which located in North City. The cafe won funding from a Washington University to open the socially, community-minded cafe that is intended to strength the neighborhood's sense of community. (Click here for a Beacon story.)

One audience member observed the event and gushed, PechaKucha "was so exciting, especially to see so many people sharing such a mix of new ideas. It was all very positive.”

That view was ratified by Danielle Aslanian, 27. "I like the idea that anyone can present any idea they have," she said.

According to Eric Thoelke, who was collecting money at the door, 250 people attended. The audience members, whose ages ranged from early 20s to a few in their mid-70s, sat in folding chairs in the basement of Bridge Wine Bar and Tap House on Locust Street. The event did not require reservations but requested a $5 minimum donation to Architecture for Humanity, which provides relief efforts for Haiti: 100 percent of the money collected at the door and 50 percent of bar sales went to relief efforts.

The PechaKucha presentations with the best responses were the ones that told unexpected St. Louis stories. The presentations that seemed to fall a little flat used the five minutes as marketing plugs for their nonprofit organizations.