REC Philly expands to Miami with help from Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs

Talent incubator REC Philly is expanding to Miami, and Sean “Diddy” Combs is helping to make it happen.

Sean Combs Capital is investing $2 million to help the Philadelphia-based start-up, which operates its 10,000-square-foot facility in Center City’s Fashion District, to create REC Miami.

Slated to open in 2023 in the Little River section of the city, REC Miami will be a 12,000-square-foot creative center equipped with a recording studio, photo and video production studio, podcast studios, dance and design studios, production equipment, and editing bays. It will also have an event venue.

“Our goal is to make sure that independent creators have the information, tools and resources needed to win and level the playing field,” said Combs, in a statement announcing the new enterprise. “This partnership is about the future of the creator economy and helping REC expand to serve more creators in cities and countries around the world.”

With the funding, REC joins Combs Enterprises, which will not only utilize REC’s spaces but also tap into its talent for projects, according to information provided by the company.

The move into Miami is a big step forward for Dave Silver and Will Toms, the founders of REC — Resources for Every Creator. Good friends since their student days at William Tennent High School in Warminster, the business partners, both now 31, started with little but their shared passion for the creative arts and their entrepreneurial spirit.

Since starting REC Philly in 2015, they’ve grown their incubator to more than 1,000 members.

The REC model is not a proponent of the starving artist school of creativity. Besides providing creators with the tools they need, REC also functions as a creative agency that has helped direct nearly $2 million directly to its members. Local “brand partners” such as Live Nation, Comcast, WXPN, T-Mobile, Temple University, and many others have provided support and employ the talents of members for their projects. REC has also collaborated with public radio stations WXPN-FM (88.5) and WRTI-FM (90.1) on the Black Music City Project, which has provided grants to create new artistic works inspired by Philadelphia’s Black music history.

“Our goal is to make sure that independent creators have the information, tools and resources needed to win and level the playing field.”

Silver said he and his partner are looking forwarding to bringing REC’s support to creators in Miami.

“I’m personally very excited to bridge the gap in Miami, the way that we’ve done here in Philadelphia,” he said in an interview Wednesday, “where the brands and the local community now have a very clear way to work with local creators.”

Both the Combs organization and the REC partners were interested in Miami, Silver said.

“The driver is the level of talent in a city and the level of infrastructure of the [entertainment and cultural] industry in the city,” he said.

Both Philadelphia and Miami have a lot of talent, he said, but too many of their creative people have to leave for such cities as New York or Los Angeles, where there are more entertainment or cultural opportunities. Both cities are also places where residents aren’t strangers to the discrepancies in opportunity for people of color. Silver said REC views addressing that as a key part of its mission.

“It’s about leveling the playing field, and it’s about providing access to folks that traditionally don’t have access to these resources as easily as others,” he said.

Their intention is to not stop with Miami.

“We want Miami to work really well,” he said. “Then we want to be able to build this across the country and then across the world.”