Ignite Philly 26

20 slides. 15 seconds each. 5 minutes.

Ignite Philly is a community speaker series where each presenter gets exactly twenty slides that auto-advance every fifteen seconds. Five minutes, no mercy. The result is a room full of Philadelphians geeking out, laughing, and leaving inspired. Join us for the 26th edition.

Enlighten us, but make it quick.

The People Behind It

Your Curators

Geoff DiMasi

Co-founder & Curator

Geoff co-founded Ignite Philly in 2008, a collaboration between his design studio P’unk Ave, Indy Hall, and The Hacktory, and has helped curate every edition since. A designer, educator, and serial civic instigator, he teaches entrepreneurship, innovation, and strategy at Temple University’s Fox School of Business.

Christine Knapp

Curator

Christine led the City of Philadelphia’s Office of Sustainability from 2016 to 2022, directing the Greenworks framework and the city’s first Climate Action Playbook. She has spent her career at the heart of Philadelphia’s environmental and civic life, from PennFuture to the Philadelphia Water Department.

Claire Robertson-Kraft

Curator

Claire is the founder and executive director of ImpactED at the University of Pennsylvania and Faculty Co-Director at Penn’s Fels Institute of Government. A lifelong champion of civic engagement, she is a co-founder of PhillyCORE Leaders and former board chair of Young Involved Philadelphia.

Since 2008

A Short History

Ignite began in Seattle in 2006, and Philadelphia answered two years later with one of the first spinoffs anywhere. The first Ignite Philly packed Johnny Brenda's in 2008, and the crowd's question on the way out the door, “When's the next one?”, turned a one-night experiment into one of the city's longest-running traditions. Hundreds of speakers later, the format hasn't changed: five minutes, twenty slides, and a room full of people who love this city.

“…the ability to change the world is more real than ever.”
Brian James Kirk, Philebrity, after the first Ignite Philly (2008)

2006

Ignite is born in Seattle. The 5-minute, 20-slide format spreads worldwide.

2008

The first Ignite Philly lights up Johnny Brenda’s in Fishtown, and sells out. By fall, there’s already a second one.

2009–2011

The early years set the tone: anything goes. Drew Olanoff’s “My Cancer Is Social,” the Berley brothers of Franklin Fountain, teens building hybrid cars, and the launch story of a scrappy news startup called Technically Philly.

2012

Ignite Philly 10 sells out weeks in advance. More than 150 speakers by edition ten, from the Opera Company of Philadelphia to “A Brief History of Herringbone.”

2013

A future curator takes the stage. Christine Knapp teaches a packed house “How to Karaoke” at Ignite Philly 11.

2014–2016

Ideas that became institutions. Patrice Banks pitches Girls Auto Clinic, Ariell Johnson previews Amalgam Comics & Coffeehouse, Crazy Aaron explains Thinking Putty, and bike share comes to Philly.

2018

Ten years of Ignite Philly. Edition 21 celebrates a decade of ideas, with talks spanning accessibility, democracy, goats, and beyond.

2026

Twenty-five and counting. Ignite Philly 25 hit the Johnny Brenda’s stage in June, and number 26 lands there on October 21.