Design to Connect: A Community Learn-in

In autumn 2020 we brought together over 200 members of the Loneliness Lab community to share insights about how design can be used to connect us.

From parks that welcome everyone to housing that turns neighbours into friends, we shared questions, perspectives and ideas, and identified shared challenges together to make our cities less lonely.

Over 200 individuals and organisations joined our community ‘learn-in’ series in Autumn 2020

• We brought the conversations around loneliness in the built environment to one place.
• We uncovered the latest research and findings from designers and place-makers on how they’re designing connectedness into urban spaces.
• We explored opportunities for future action and have launched a global community platform to enable members to connect directly.

What we created together proved to be much bigger than ourselves; a heartfelt and thought-provoking week connecting a global community around a shared interest in tackling loneliness that surfaced some key insights.

In the first week, our learn-in featured the following sessions:

• Loneliness 101- discussing the latest in loneliness research, joined by the British Red Cross and London is Lonely.
• Workplaces — featuring Lendlease, Savills , Basha-Franklin and Workclub HQ.
• Residential spaces — with contributions from Matter, Space, Soul, Mainstay, Lendlease, Greater London Authority and graduates from the University of Cambridge.
• Public spaces — featuring Publica, Urban Scale Interventions, Street Space and Lendlease.
• Highstreets and shared spaces — featuring If_Do Architects, Elephant Says Hi, HKS Architects, Monkey Park community hub and the Centre for Ageing Better.

Full videos of these sessions are included below and the insights from the event series have been turned into a crowdsourced report.

We’re delighted that the ‘learn-in’ has already sparked several collaborations and collective action amongst the community, including a joint submission into the recent government white paper on planning.

To join the conversation and be part of future shared learnings and collaborations join the Loneliness Lab Network on Groups IO.

Loneliness 101

Thanks to: Rasteen Riyahi Boni (British Red Cross), Jake Heitland (Lendlease)

Workplace Loneliness

Thanks to: Clare Bailey (Savills), Rachel Edwards (Lendlease), Nicola Osborne (Basha-Franklin), Ajay Palekar (Workclub HQ)

Housing

Thanks to: Pauline Martin (Lendlease), Natasha Reid (Matter Space Soul, Anwyn Hocking, Shaun Matthews, Ernest Harris (Mainstay)

Public Spaces

Thanks to: Selina Mason (Lendlease), Lucy Pritchard(Publica), Jak Spender (Urban Scale Interventions), Philippa Banister (Street Space), Shaparak Rahimi (Lendlease)

High streets + communities

Thanks to: Emily Georghiou(Centre for Ageing Better), Erin Peavey (HKS Architects), Thomas Bryans (If_Do Architects), Liza Makarov (Elephant Says Hi), Simon Redding (Monkey Park)