Most of what has been written about the role of creativity for urban growth and development and about so called creative cities has used a very narrow definition of creativity and creative occupations and focused on a narrow set of so-called creative industries. This is unfortunate since creativity today is central and increasingly important also in other industries and within universities and research institutes for enhancing economic development. The present paper argues for a wider definition of creativity for the study of creative cities. The purpose is to discuss aspects of creativity and creative cities partly using inputs from the Swedish regional science tradition. © 2014 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.