How To Improve Social Interaction With Design
It’s always good to start with a caveat so let me do just that. I am not an architect, town planner or designer. In fact, my ‘professional’ history goes something like this: first I was a data analyst, which was then followed by a brief period of quarter life crisis being a gardener down under, and now I’m in the process of reimagining myself studying physics. Anyway, what I’d like to talk about is the importance of design when it comes to social interaction.
There is a road in my hometown called St Mary’s Terrace. In the summer, I like to walk up this road on my way to enjoy the views of the Sea, which come when one reaches the small ‘summit’ that is the West hill, in the middle-ish size Sussex coast town of Hastings (that is the Queen’s (God bless her) country of England if you are a foreigner). After a few weeks of traversing the broken pavements and viewing the pleasant flower arrangements that the road has to offer, it struck me that: A. the sunset is god damn lovely on a summer evening on the west hill and B. the people are really friendly on this road for some reason. Now, there were two possible conclusions one could draw from this observation, 1. The people on this road happen, for some reason, to be especially friendly and nice, or 2. The characteristics of the road lead, somehow, to pleasantries being exchanged with the random folk who happen upon the road on a summer eve. Truth be told I think there is a combination effect, which for a data analyst is particularly frustrating, but let me try and break it down for you.
Each of the houses on St Mary’s has a front road-facing garden where the occupant’s sit outside enjoying the view of the small town. There is no gap, boundary or fence between these gardens and the road, so one walking up it is in direct and immediate contact with the occupant’s who live there. Another thing is the road is very thin, so one cannot avoid but to pass people by very closely, and lastly, there is almost no traffic going up and down the road. The combined effect is something akin to “intimacy” between fellow human beings, the very feeling of the road, with the summer sunsets and exchange of banter, is intimate and communal, and it got me thinking a lot about how design can affect mood and community relations.
I now live in a city in the North of the Netherlands called Groningen, it is very built up with lots of terraced housing. Leaving my house and going onto the road is an experience of absoluteness. There is such a clear-cut boundary between road and house that there is no in-between, no openness, no possibility, which means a conversation could never occur. I wonder if anyone knows their neighbours here or, more disturbingly, if the concept of “neighbourhood” could even exist in such surroundings. Anyway, the feeling of harshness you get is clear, and it’s a bad thing I have no doubt!
This effect does not just existent on roads, it is also exists in communal spaces. In India, which I visited last year, one sits on the floor in a very open seating arrangement. The result is people talk to each other across groups and arrangements — in short it is very open and free. Basically there is no barrier to stop you from talking to some, which makes it much less awkward. It got me thinking, is the seating arrangement of a restaurant actually a kind of barrier? For example, to interrupt a table and say “how do you do?” is a completely different kettle of fish to talking to someone who is happening to be sitting next to you anyway. We’ve designed our spaces in the west to be of the nature of obstacle, this is where I live and that is your place, but St Mary’s has an element of the former. The thing is, it has the right balance, we don’t want to be so open that one can walk in to our house at any point, but we want to be open enough that the common humanity we all share can prevail.
One important thing to note is that this all clearly depends on personality. The people who live on this road are probably partially drawn to it simply because of the fact that it is open and you can talk to others. Similarly, obviously the people (hippies cough!) who go to India to do Yoga teacher training courses, are people who will be open to sitting next to randoms, but at the same time, I think most people, particularly older people, can benefit a lot from community, and I believe we are in danger, because of necessary changes in the economy like people not working where they live and moving more, of losing the sense of community that makes living more pleasant and worthwhile.
I’ll end with an example to get you thinking. When I came back from my brief foray down under, it suddenly dawned on me that all my friends were suddenly into climbing. This went against all my preconceived expectations of changes that may have happened. I thought “maybe someone will be fat when I go back” or “maybe someone will have got their girlfriend “preggers” (school boy slang), but no, what actually happened is that suddenly, and unexpectedly, people were into climbing (bouldering actually, climbing indoors without ropes for those uncivilised folk). Now what I began to realise as I frequented these Bouldering centres with them, is that, A. It is fun and enjoyable but B. there is a more complex reason for this sudden surge of bouldering enthusiasm. (It is one of the fastest growing sports in the U.K and set to be featured in the Olympics if you are interested). The reason I think it is becoming so popular is the set up is perfect for social interaction with strangers. The design of the sport is such that you are often sat next to randoms all trying to solve similar problems. There is no awkwardness with attending the place by yourself, in essence, there is very little barriers in the space to stop social interaction - in fact, the sport is a natural social lubricant. A common occurrence, in such places, is for people to ask others how one should go about attempting to climb a particularly troubling “route”, or even better, people often see you struggling and will come over instinctively. The whole set up is communal and I think people are crying out for that, hence it’s rise in popularity.
So let me end by saying this, happiness in life can be determined by many things, but one thing we may have not emphasised so much is space. Space and design are critical for determining how a situation will go, whether it will be cold and awkward, or whether it will be smooth and nice. One cannot avoid awkwardness, (particularly as an Englishman), but we can certainly minimise it to feel more at home with the people around us. In short, I’m pro St Mary’s Terrace and maybe we should generate some noise to get more of our spaces designed in such a way. Over and out Crane….
