Yesterday I had the brilliant opportunity to speak with Sam Peters who is one of the founders of Planted. I recently saw Sam speak at the Fika with Friends conference, which inspired me to get in touch.
Planted is running London’s first zero waste event at Granary Square on the 23-26th September. It was great to hear more about the event and the future plans for Planted. For instance, expanding their podcast outreach, lauching a members area, future events and much more.
Panted installation during London Design Festival in Granary Square, King’s Cross
Having spoken to Sam about my work and how our aims are very much alined to connect people to nature in innovative ways, Sam kindly offered for me to get involved in their event this September. Therefore, I will be attending the event on Thursday (23rd) and Friday (24th) and assiting in anyway I can, as well as meeting with the team. This is a very exciting opportuniy to make many more connections within my stakeholder network and learn more about cuttting-edge work in the field of biophilia and sustianability.
I will also look to work with Planted past this event as they continue to expand, and hopefully find key opportunites for overlap and collaboration in our goals.
Reflection
Being invited to take part in the Planted event feels like a big breakthrough in my work, which expresses that my project is valuable to the scetor and my stakeholders. Having this validation of my work that others are interested in it to the point that they want me to collaborate in their work allows me to feel I am on the right track, talking to the right people and persuing new ways to create changes in connecting to nature.
My project aims to re-connect people to nature by bringing the outside indoors, focusing on hospitality venues. The project challenges convention through developing natural events, experiences and designs that develop 1-1 personal connections to nature by evoking the senses and allowing individuals to experience the health benefits of interacting with nature1. Hospitality is the focus due to the popularity of the spaces2, the current lack of biophilic design3, the rise in sustainably conscious venues4 and the lifting of covid restrictions creating an opportunity to reattract customers in innovative and dynamic ways.
Question
Through the journey of my research, my question has evolved to become:
How can connections to nature be improved through visiting hospitality businesses that serve food and drink in cities?
Research Methodology
To explore the aims of my project I have deployed a plethora of research methods. Including, consulting books, academic texts, meeting with experts and stakeholders; visiting hospitality and natural spaces for inspiration and observing applications of nature. The knowledge gathered from this research has been utilised to develop the most suitable and impactful interventions to generate change amongst my stakeholders.
Research
The foundation of my project has been derived from academic texts and books. Reading ‘Design a Healthy Home’5 provided the details of how to apply biophilic concepts into physical spaces. Exploring the academic iterations of scales, such as the Inclusion of Nature in Self Scale6 to measure connections to nature deciphered the appropriate format to measure changes in connection with my Herb Event. The springboard for my most recent creative ideas regarding future iterations of my interventions has been reading ‘Rewild Yourself’7. The book offered alternative perspectives on barriers to nature alongside the vastness of nature, which led to considering unique areas of and ways to access nature in future interventions. Additional knowledge has been obtained from visits to different hospitality venues to assess their uses of nature, as demonstrated on the Instagram page @nature.i.n.8. Inspiration and market awareness were gained from discovering sustainability campaigns such as ‘Good Nature’ at Selfridges9.
Furthermore, I have consulted with biophilic experts including Kristina Libby10 and Hedi Leneartz11 to discuss directions for my work, its impacts, outcomes, and iterations. I have spoken with hospitality business12 and customers13 to establish their different desires towards incorporating nature. Valuable feedback in these meetings were the catalyst for developing the online sharing group, to gather greater data of this type.
My first panel discussion14 was ultimately utilised for research, rather than an intervention, because there was no live audience as intended. Biophilic and biomimetic experts discussed the most effective and innovative applications of nature that could be introduced into hospitality spaces. Discussion provided insightful ideas regarding how to target the senses and technobiophilia. Such conversations contributed to developing the Herb Event, playing off the herb’s scents, textures, and tastes.
A key discovery in my research process has been Technobiophilia. Research led to the work of Sue Thomas, a pioneer in the field whose work I have analysed15, which directed questioning of how technology and nature can be fused together to develop unique methods for connecting to nature. Subsequently, a technobiophilic event is set to occur around 22nd September at Chelsea College of Arts once the canteen space has reopened16.
Interventions
Chelsea College of Arts – Herb Event 20th – 21st July I have developed a contact in the head of catering at Chelsea College of Arts, which has provided the opportunity to hold interventions in their hospitality spaces17. The event involved an array of herbs being presented for customers to come and pick to go with their food or to take home with them18. Upon arrival, I asked customers to complete a series of 4 questions based upon the measure of Inclusion of Nature in Self to rate their connection to nature17. Before participants left, I re-asked the questions to assess if there had been any change in their connection to nature. I provided customers with herb cuttings of their choice to take home and a card explaining different ways to utilise the herbs, alongside a QR code to an online survey form for added feedback.
Results determined that there was a slight increase in connection to nature from this event of 2.5%19 among the 40 participants, but this could be increased if participants had longer to engage with the herbs. A stunning 85% of participants stated that they would actively visit a hospitality venue if it was offering a natural event or experience, suggesting a large market for this work. Throughout the event, many customers stated they felt disconnected from nature living in London, which led to defining cities in my question as an area where many people lack but are ready to receive nature20.
Online Sharing Group
I have developed a sharing group via Facebook where customers of hospitality spaces post applications of nature that they like, or dislike accompanied by short comments as to why they hold this opinion21. Change was to be created utilising the data to develop to applications of nature that are attractive to customers. Results from the group have been limited in user posts, but the group has gained members and likes22. It appeared there was an audience for this idea, but the platform was wrong to engage people. The Nature.In Instagram page has instead been utilised to promote hospitality spaces showcasing nature, to encourage customers to visit such spaces and connect with nature in this way. This page is also helping to form a conversation and community in the comments section, through the page’s growing following which is currently at over 70 followers22.
2nd Panel Discussion – 26th August via Stream Yard
My second panel included 4 biophilic experts and a live audience to learn how they can apply nature in spaces and ask questions23. The panel aimed to establish pioneering adaptations of the interventions I have been conducting. Discussion flowed through a series of question prompts encouraging analysis of each intervention and ideas for future events24. Measuring connection via blood pressure changes, utilising unusual spaces for events, exploring alternative media options for sharing groups and technobiophilia were readily discussed25.
Audience
My stakeholders are split into three key groups: biophilic experts, hospitality professionals and hospitality customers. My interventions have been derived to ensure all stakeholder groups are part of the research.
Intervention
Stakeholders Targeted
1st Panel Discussion
Experts in biophilic and biomimetic design
Herb Event
Hospitality business and customers
Online Sharing Group
Hospitality business and customers
2nd Panel Discussion
Experts in biophilic and biomimetic design Hospitality business and customers invited as an audience to online live stream
Conclusion
I feel my communication with stakeholders in analysing what aspects of natural experiences are ground-breaking and beneficial to all parties has led to the success my project has seen so far. This is something I look to continue and grow my network into Unit 3. Alternatively, a weakness in my process was around the start of July when I spent a long time in May–July securing a hospitality site to test my natural concepts in. Perseverance here led to a key breakthrough in securing the opportunity to run interventions at Chelsea College of Arts and later a meeting with The Marylebone hotel. However, in reflection placing so much emphasis on the importance of securing a testing venue was a slight oversight in my research process.
Looking forward, I feel to push this project further I need to move past my current standing further into the unknown. I believe this new angle may lie around technobiophilia26. I look forward to meeting with Sue Thomas and Hedi Leneartz over the coming week to explore this avenue further and continue to develop original iterations of my interventions building upon the most effective aspects so far.
Kleespies, M.W., Braun, T., Dierkes, P.W. and Wenzel, V., 2021. “Measuring connection to nature—a illustrated extension of the inclusion of nature in self scale.” Sustainability, 13(4), p.1761.
Martin, C. and Czellar, S. (2016) “The extended inclusion of nature in self scale.” Journal of Environmental Psychology, 47, pp.181-194.
Schultz, P.W., (2002). “Inclusion with nature: The psychology of human-nature relations.” In Psychology of sustainable development (pp. 61-78). Springer, Boston, MA.
Below I have included images of my ideas notebook, which showcase the journey of my current thinking to iterate the interventions I have conducted. The pages at the bottom are my most recent thoughts, to try and demonstrate the evolution of my thinking. Further on in the blog post I demonstrate synthesising some of these ideas into next step progressions for my project.
Ideas Journey for Iterations of Interventions:
From these ideas, I see future iterations of my work being split into almost 2 tracts to achieve the goals of improving connections to nature through hospitality venues (see below).
I am still going to pursue interventions with Chelsea College of Arts and The Marylebone Hotel, which offers amazing sites to test my interventions in. However, they may have slight restrictions on the extent to which I can experiment in technological events. Chelsea is more open to trying out an experimental idea and so I will begin trying to implement new ideas there over Marylebone. However, I am interested in exploring whether any unusual/ unused spaces may be available to test out the more experimental and risky technological interventions. For instance, cafes that are otherwise closed in the evenings or an unused backroom in a venue. I am also interested in exploring an experiment whereby participants blood pressure is measured before and after the event in a fun way. Possibly this smaller unusual space idea is better suited to that type of experiment, which can yield strong empirical evidence on the power of these events to increase connection to nature.
Experimenting with Nature and AR
I have recently been researching and explore further into the world of AR and projections in technology, as I have no current experience in the field but have a keen interest in technological advancements. I have begun experimenting with Abode Aero software and created this very rough initial mock-up to consider how nature can be utilised in a virtual AR experience (see below).
Reflection
I feel full of new streams of thought at the moment and a multitude of different ideas to explore and build upon further, especially after the recent conversations with Kristina Libby and in my 2nd Panel discussion. I am very excited to get stuck into exploring what is possible in the realms of technophilia over the coming weeks and gain added insights into the field after my scheduled conversation with Sue Thomas who is a pioneer in the field. I need to look to bring together the many strands of ideas I now have running around in my head into some actionable adaptions of interventions that I can introduce into venues to test out the effectiveness of the concepts in improving connections to nature.
I will unpack the following results gained from the 1st google forms which has collated data across both the Tuesday and the Wednesday of the event.
The data for rating connections to nature after interacting with herbs was only collated on the Wednesday and this is why there are only 22 respondents to those questions rather than 40. This was due to on the Tuesday I deemed the interactions with the herbs from people only passing through the cafe for a quick coffee etc to be too short to impact their connection to nature. So, I was relying on people completing the questions on the second google form once they were home to achieve an ‘after herbs’ result. This is because passersby of this sort were the main people I interacted with through the event, as they were the predominate customers of the cafe. However, after getting home on the Tuesday evening and reviewing the answers submitted in the 2nd google forms from the 19 people I had spoken to that day, only 1 had completed the form. Therefore, I realised on the Wednesday it was necessary to ask everyone the before and after questions then and there, in the hope of achieving some form of comparable data between before and after the herb interactions. Even up to this day only 3 people have given any answers on the 2nd google form, but only 1 has completed the majority of questions, the other two have only answered the first three questions!
The 1st Google Forms
The vast majority of participants in my event were females, although tis was predominately over the first day, with the Wednesday being more balanced between males and females. Across the 2 day event I managed to reached the majority of age ranges in some proportion, which I was happy with in gaining a sample of the public in relation to customers of hospitality spaces, as under 18s are less likely to visit hospitality spaces of their own accord.
Inclusion of Nature in Self Scale
Here we observe the top 3 most connected options (E, F, G) to hold 47.5% of the responses when asked at the start of the event. This almost being half of the participants, in this sample, means that the customers were already feeling fairly strongly connected to nature on the whole. The least connected option of A and B held the least amount of responses with only 7.5% of the vote.
When the question was asked again after taking part and engaging in the herb event, 50% of responses were the top 3 most connected options. This slight change (2.5%) in reported connectedness to nature suggests that there is strength in the event to impact connection to nature, which is very promising as it also had high engagement with 40 participants. To increase the rate of the change in connectedness, options such as lengthening the interaction with nature, creating more immersive interactions and transferring knowledge through the interaction may be beneficial. Consequently, these ideas will be interwoven into future iterations of the event.
However, I must be aware that the change in connection observed here between the two sections may partly reflect bias in answers from participants that think I want their answers to go up between asking the question before and after. Therefore, they may have reported a higher score after the event, even though I did assure participants I wanted truly honest answering throughout and there was no judgment in any answers given.
Rating Connection to Nature 1-10
Overall, the responses to the rankings of connectedness mimic that of the answers given to the inclusion of nature in self scale. The majority of answers are 7-10 on the scale and there is a slight increase in the scores given after the event. Subsequently, I feel that asking participants to rank their connection 1-10 may not be necessary next time, when also using the inclusion of nature in self scale. I only included this answer to gain greater detail into peoples connection by giving it a numerical value, but I realise the answers are rather similar to that of the scale and I feel that the scale is more accurate in targeting the relationship to nature I am trying to assess.
Rating Concern for Nature 1-10
The results for this question are skewed very much towards the higher end of the scale, with no responses for 1-4 on either the before or after questioning. This suggests concern for nature to be something rooted very highly amongst customers of this space. Therefore, concern for nature itself could be something worked into further interventions. For instance, creating sustainable events, or providing people with information of easy ways that they can assist nature; even helping them to assist nature through taking part in an intervention, however that may be achieved. This is something I will look into developing into future interventions.
With all of these answers scoring so highly, I am aware that there could be social biases taking rule here whereby there is so much coverage in modern news around the worries for the planet and nature and how much we should all care for it, that this may have been reflected in the answers of participants. People may feel that they should be concerned for nature even if they aren’t, which may have created some dishonest answering.
Rating Motivations to Help Nature 1-10
There is slightly more variation in answering here than with the concern question, suggesting that although people are worried for nature, they may not feel they can or want to act in its best interests. This could be interesting to try and create interventions that do actively aid nature, but that are also very easy for customers to get involved in, for instance having herbs as table decorations or edible flowers, which people can pick, eat and learn about . This could then make people want to grow, use and interact with these parts of nature once again; thus aiding nature. However, the answers were again predominately high scoring, suggesting that the majority of customers do feel strongly to act for nature and so this can be a clear way to attract people to events and experiences, that are in the interest of nature.
Just as with the concern answers, motivation also scored highly across everyone, suggesting again people may have answered this way because they feel they should. Of Course, there is the other side of the argument that suggests maybe everyone is very concerned for nature with the effects of climate change becoming evermore present on the planet and so it could be their honest answering.
The majority of interactions over the entirety of the event were rather short, as hardly anyone actually sat and ate at the cafe, most just passed through for a quick coffee. Therefore, it was hard to make a big impact on people’s connection to nature. So, in the next iterations of the event I aim to make the interaction with nature more impactful through being slightly longer where possible.
The 2nd Google Forms
Sadly, there is very little knowledge to be gained from the 2nd google forms, which asked additional questions for feedback about the event, as well as repeating the 4 questions above but asking them about after having taken cuttings of the herbs home, if there had been any impact to connection to nature. Only 3 out of the 40 participants who were all given the QR code to the forms have completed any answering, but no one has fully completed it and so there is little to evaluate from this forms. The only clear take away is this people are very unlikely to complete forms in their own time through this methodology, and so gaining responses then and there is vastly a better option.
If anymore responses are posted on the 2nd google forms over the coming days I will be sure to do an analysis of the findings.
Take Aways:
Having studied the results from the google forms and the feedback I recorded during the event, I have established the following parameters need to be incorporated into future iterations. There was a strong uptake in the event and a small change in connection (2.5%) despite interaction with the event begging short for most participants, which shows promise in the event and means that it can definitely be built upon to create even greater change in strength of connection to nature, see below ways for how to consider doing this:
The interaction with the natural elements needs to be longer to evoke a change in people’s connection to nature. Making events more immersive, or transferring knowledge may also be tested out to achieve this goal.
85% of 40 people asked said that they would be attracted to a venue specifically if it was offering an experience with nature. The others would said that they wouldn’t be strictly attracted to visit the space, but many said they would still enjoy the natural elements once there but it wouldn’t draw them to the venue on their own. Suggesting there is a big market for natural events, experiences and designs.
Needs to collate guaranteed before and after answers to the questions surrounding connection, as people rarely fill in forms after the event.
Utilise inclusion of Nature in Self Scale as predominate measure, ask to rate concern and motivations to act for nature 1-10 if possible, but not as essential.
The questions asked around connection need to be kept short to ensure engagement remains high.
The event needs to bring nature to the people, as they feel far removed from it in the city.
Create events to aid people’s concern for nature, which will also attract these people to the events. For instance, sustainable events, or providing people with information of easy ways that they can assist nature, or assisting nature through taking part in the event itself
To get people motivated to act in the interest of nature create interventions that do actively aid nature, but that are also very easy for customers to get involved in. These events can then also attract those already motivated to help nature, as they will be aiding it even further.
The biggest breakthrough here is demonstrating that events like this can improve people’s connection to nature, even in a small way.
Quite honesty prior to this past week, work on my project to secure a site to test my interventions in had been rather slow and demoralising for me. It had involved day after day of phone calls and emails trying all manner of ideas I had to try and contact venues in which I could possibly run an intervention, no matter how small it may be. However, all my ideas were coming up dry and after all there is only so much positivity and pushing through the pain you can give a matter before the wall of unread emails and negative replies start to make you question whether you are actually going to be able to succeed in this aspect of the venture. And as much as I don’t want to admit it, I was starting to fall into that downtrodden trap of losing faith in securing a public hospitality venue to test my interventions in.
So, I took a step back and tried to remind my self why I was wanting to do this project in the first place. I took a day to revisit the nature I so keenly want to bring into peoples lives. Consequently, I went to explore new natural spaces and parks through going for walks and taking in the atmosphere of being surrounded by nature. Sometimes a refresher in your goals and motivators with a little step back really is all you need to keep going.
And so the quest continued email after email call after call; even just popping my head into a restaurant or pubs whilst I was walking by asking if they would be interested. But, I was still consistently getting turned away.
However, a few days ago I really had a breakthrough moment. I got a positive reply. The head of catering at the Chelsea Collage of Arts responded to my email and was really interested in my work and wanted to meet with me to discuss the different forms my work could take in their spaces. And there it was I was off, I grabbed the meeting with both hands and prepared mock- ups of what interventions would look like in their main canteen space, I thought of other smaller interventions they may wish to implement, I poured everything into preparing. The meeting went very well and I ended up being able to secure the possibility for multiple interventions in their spaces; which was better than I could have hoped. Subsequently, this was a big breakthrough or me finally being able to get my foot through the door somewhere.
As they say no one will let you build a building until you have built one, so once you get that first opportunity, you can leverage it to gain many more. Therefore, this is exactly what I began to do and contacted a family friend who I knew had a contact with the head chef at the Marylebone Hotel. After talking with her about the up and coming event I was running at the Chelsea Collage of Arts, I was able to get her to pass on my details to the head chef who has consequently agreed to have a meeting with me about any possible ideas and interventions I may be able to host there which is extremely exciting.
So, not to get to ahead of myself, but after a bit of a shaky patch where there wasn’t much to show for the work I had been putting in, finally the results are starting to slowly slot into place. I am very excited to see where these next steps can take my project and push it past its current realms.
After my many emails and calls sent out over the past few weeks, I finally gained a positive and keen response last Friday!! The response was from the head of catering at the Chelsea Collage of Arts, who was very interested in my intervention proposals and wanted to meet at the Chelsea canteen sight.
So, a meeting was set for Tuesday 13th July. I was a mix of excited and admittedly slightly nervous, as this is the first real opportunity I have had where someone was very keen for me to test my proposed ideas and so I really wanted the meeting to go well. I spent the weekend prepping as much as possible. I developed mock ups of the canteen space to demonstrate what could be added where in preliminary interventions; ensuring no irreversible changes would be made to the space and keeping it relatively simple to avoid any severe interference with their day to day practises. The mock up of my initial intervention ideas for the space can be viewed below. I also developed a selection of natural themes that could be applied to the space dependent on their food offering, as I researched the canteen space and discovered that they have done themed food events in the past. Therefore, I thought I could potentially coincide these food events with an intervention to create a natural environment utilising technology that plays off the food. The list of these ideas can also be seen below.
During the pitch to the catering manager of Chelsea I spoke through the changes I wish to make for both the hospitality venues themselves and their customers through creating biophilic environments, which I have summarised below. I also addressed why I wish to test whether technology could aid connection to nature through utilising technobiophilia principles, alongside the importance of targeting the senses through scent and sound to create immersive natural environments that connect people to nature; and evoke the wellbeing benefits of interacting with nature.
Interventions in theCanteen Space
To my delight the pitch went very well. Dashnor, the catering manager was very interested in my proposed ideas to bring nature into their spaces and gave me the go ahead to conduct interventions in the Chelsea hospitality spaces. However, at present the canteen area is shut due to not enough students being on campus to sustain it and so only the cafe and courtyard area are currently open. Therefore, I agreed with Dashnor to move ahead with the technobiophilic intervention in the canteen area in September when more students are back on site and it is expected that the canteen area can reopen. Below I have included more pictures of the canteen space that I took on my visit. You can notice there is already small efforts made to bring nature into the space with their use of plants and natural materials such as wood, but there is plenty more that can be built off of this.
Interventions in the Cafe/ Courtyard Space
In the meantime, I have been granted access to test idea sin the cafe space as well as the large courtyard area that the cafe hosts tables in. This courtyard area is also opposite Tate Britain and the public are welcome to utilise the cafe facilities, making it a prime venue to target customers in.
Dashnor was very keen on my ideas of targeting the senses and also testing physical applications of nature that people could interact with. Consequently, I have developed the idea of a Herb Event that I am going to be hosting at the Chelsea cafe’s and courtyard area on Tuesday and Wednesday next week (20th and 21st July). The event will involve bringing a selection of herbs to the courtyard area which customers are able to come up and cut to add to their food, as the cafe offers a range of foods that change every few days including curry through to salads and sandwiches.
I will be present at the duration of the events to interact with the customers and to ask them about their relationships with nature, involving starting a conversation about how interacting with the herbs has impacted them, or not. I will ask customers a series of 3 short questions assessing their connection to nature before providing them with the herbs; I will then re-ask the questions before they leave to measure if there has been any change in their connection to nature. I will also provide customers with a QR code on cards I am having made to promote the event, which customers can scan to answer extra questions around their connection to nature and the impacts of the event; so that I can gain added feedback from the willing customers.
Additionally, there will be an opportunity for people to take some smaller herb plants home with them from the event or some picked herbs. This is to assess if taking the herbs into their daily lives impacts their connection to nature more greatly than just interacting with them during the event. Customers who take the herbs home will also be provided with a card featuring tips of how to utilise the herbs with certain foods, and will also feature the QR code to a google forms of additional questions reflecting on their experience in taking the herbs home.
Feedback from customers throughout the events will also be recorded to gain an understand of what customers are looking for to improve their connection to nature in these spaces and whether an offering like this would attract them to visit a hospitality space. This intervention will also help to establish the value of physical interactions with nature, which can be later compared to that of interactions to nature through technology. Pictures of the cafe site and courtyard are included below. Greater details on preparing for this intervention will be included in a later blog post.
Reflection:
I am so happy to have finally secured a venue in which I can being some physical testing of my concepts through interventions, especially that I can get stuck into testing so quickly as next week! It has been a long journey, but the struggle of continuing on in this line of enquiry to conduct testing in public hospitality venues has eventually been worthwhile. Although, I will still continue my pursuit of securing other differing hospitality venues to run interventions in, on the back burner, to ensure my project has the greatest outreach possible.
I have researched and comprised a list of immersive art installations and experiences which also host hospitality settings serving food and drinks. I am looking to contact these venues to ask if it would be possible to test my ideas and concepts in their spaces. Additionally, I am looking to visit some of these spaces over the coming days to gain inspiration for my ideas as well a knowledge into the practicalities of how immersive events are being run in these instances.
‘Terra Nexus’
25 artists coming together to create a maze of immersive micro-installations on the South Bank, all about ecology.
immersive art with a message, so you can lose yourself and better yourself at the same time
Unfortunately, this event stopped running on the 30th June.
But I am still going to contact the organisers to ask about collaborating on further events they may be involved in alongside how they felt the event went and if there was anything they would change for future events, so I can aim to learn from their experiences.
(Art Rabbit, 2021) and (Proposition Studios, 2021)
Yayoi Kusama
Arguably the most famous immersive art experience in London at the moment is Yayoi Kusama’s Infinity Mirror Rooms.
Sadly, tickets are currently sold out and so I am unable to visit this exhibition.
However, it is being hosted at the Tate Modern which also homes the River Terrace serving food and drink and so I will contact them to enquire about testing in their spaces.
(Tate Britain, 2021)
Heather Phillipson
Hosted in Tate Britain’s enormous Duveen Galleries with a huge, free installation where viewers can meet mutant creatures and abandoned chunks of rotting technology, accompanied by enticing lighting schemes.
Rupture No 1: Blowtorching the Bitten Peach’ is at Tate Britain until January 23rd 2022.
The technology utilised in this immersive experience coupled with Tate Britain’s Djanogly cafe facilities could help to host a type of natural immersive eating experience strengthening people’s connection to nature.
Tate Britain does usually host a restaurant as well as this cafe, but that is closed at present. Looking to the future, if this restaurant reopens I will certainly contact them with regards to testing my project ideas.
Therefore, I plan on visiting this exhibition and talking to the organisers to see if there could be an opportunity to test my ideas in any capacity to utilise these facilities.
(Tate, 2021)
Ryoji Ikeda
Ryoji Ikeda’s biggest ever European show sends viewers through room after room of stunning light and sound installations.
The instillation is at 180 The Strand until the 1st August 2021
I will contact The Strand to discover more about their hospitality facilities to see if it would be possible to test my ideas there, as there is little mention of food and drink facilities on their website.
(180 The Strand, 2021)
Van Gogh
The immersive experience of Van Gogh’s work is being held at 106 Commercial Street in a 19th century stable building, opposite Old Spitalfields Market
The exhibition features two storey projections in 360 degrees, with virtual reality sparking real interaction
It is run by Fever and Exhibition Hub, which I will contact looking to collaborate in testing my ideas with similar technologies they have utilised here but naturally on a smaller scale to begin with.
From what I can tell the exhibition doesn’t host an hospitality facilities, but the technology utilised to create the event could be incredibly beneficial in how to approach hosting a similar experience for my project
(Van Gogh Expo, 2021)
Camden Art Centre
This art centre presents a slightly smaller venue which it may be more possible to test in
There are strong community ties and an ethos of connecting to everyone’s creativity, which offer a potentially strong engagement in my work
The centre hosts a cafe alongside a garden space, which would serve as a brilliant premises for testing immersive natural instillations around the food, and so I am going to get in contact with the centre to explore any testing opportunities there
(Camden Art Centre, 2021)
Sadly, many of the smaller galleries I have found with immersive exhibitions don’t host hospitality spaces which presents an issue as the don’t fit my criteria needed for a testing environment. This applies to spaces such as: Work Gallery, October Gallery, Free Space Gallery and many more.
Reflection
I will continue to research further immersive experiences across London, especially those which also host hospitality facilities. I aim to visit Tate Britain tomorrow to view the Heather Phillipson exhibit and I will post an update on my visit on my blog afterwards. Whilst I acknowledge it may be difficult to test my concepts with such large institutions as the Tate, I do feel contacting them is beneficial to gaining greater knowledge and inspiration into the practicalities of creating immersive events; and may even lead to contacts which will allow me to test. I feel that targeting the hospitality settings in these large institutions should provide a little leeway into being able to test in the spaces, rather than direclty asking to utilise their exhibition spaces. Targeting the cafes in this way may also be beneficial to them as it may attract greater customers to the spaces who would otherwise have stuck to only visiting the exhibitions. In a way, testing my concepts in the cafe turns the cafe into an exhibition and experience in itself.
I am very excited to explore this avenue further in my project, as I feel such immersive experiences are gaining a lot of traction in their own right around London at the moment. Therefore, combining my quest to connect people to nature with an immersive experience encapsulating the senses and evoking the benefits of biophilic environments could create vastly effective change and engage a multitude of people. Consequently, I am very hopeful exploration into this area may provide some fruitful insights and findings. Even if it does result that utilising technology is not the most effective way to connect people with nature, I am hopeful this avenue will at the very least help to engage venues and customers that may have otherwise been disinterested in a project looking to bring nature into spaces in a more traditional and physical sense.
I feel that supper clubs and further restaurant pop-ups will also be good spaces to host these technological tests to connect to nature and os they may be perfect venues, interested in such an immersive art and nature fusion of experience. Therefore, I will also look to contact supper clubs and more pop-up restaurants in the future.
Van Gogh Expo (2021) “Van Gogh the Immersive Experience” Van Gogh [Online] https://vangoghexpo.com/london/?utm_content=van-gogh-exhibition-london&utm_source=secretldn&utm_medium=post&utm_term=cta3 Accessed 01/07/21
At present, the largest challenge facing my project is in securing venues in which I can test the ideas I have developed so far in my project, through my work with biophilic and biomimetic experts, hospitality professionals and customers. Throughout my project I have worked with hospitality professionals to gather knowledge and develop ideas and these individuals have been very helpful in answering questions I have and adding to the development of more beneficial concepts. However, none of these contacts that I have made in the hospitality industry have been able to provide a space in which I can test my ideas as of yet.
Therefore, I have continually spent time contacting other hospitality businesses that serve food and drink in the hope I may find a space that is interested in my work and happy to allow me to test my ideas, in whatever scale they will allow. This endeavour took a back seat over the last week due to my illness, but its is a venture I am looking to put at the forefront of my work over the next week, as it is my most pressing obstacle to overcome.
I had a beneficial chance encounter at a pop-up restaurant the other week, called JOY in Notting Hill, which is focused upon sustainability and incorporates vast natural planting in their outdoor terrace. Whilst at the restaurant I met the manager of the pop-up and briefly presented him with my ideas for my project. The manager was very interested in my project and gave me his contact details, which was very promising and exciting as they are moving pop-up sites in July and so this may provide a brilliant opportunity to test ideas in a fresh site for them. I have since emailed the manager and had no further response, but I will attempt to contact him again once we get into July and I see they have moved to their new site.
Other Ways Of Testing
As a result of the issues I am facing in gaining a testing venue, I have begun to try and think of other ways to test my ideas.
Dinner Party:
Initially I have considered testing on a smaller scale in the form of a dinner party. The dinner party would involve presenting a certain cuisine such as seafood to lets say 6 people and projecting visuals of ocean seascapes along with accompanying sounds and candles of seaside smells. Then I would test how the individuals connection in nature changed from the survey at the start, during and end of the meal. The measure of connection may be conducted using simple self report questions, possibly utilising emoticons to demonstrate emotional states, as this is an easier way for participants to record their connection rate then the complex and lengthy connection to nature academic measures, such as the Inclusion fo Nature in Self. There is also academic rigour in simple emoticon self report measures, such as those utilised in airports which I discovered from Kristina Libby’s input in my panel discussion. Additionally, I further researched the validity of this measure through the works of Lassen et al. (2020) to discover its success.
However, testing in the setting of a dinner party like this isn’t very conducive to a real world experience. The participants would most likely be fiends of mine which would limit their objectivity on the project, as well as there being a very small sample size possible in a dinner party setting if I were to host it in my flat. Therefore, testing in a dinner party setting like this is as a last resort at present.
Restaurants and Cafes of Museums and Art Spaces:
In attempting to explain how I would display the visuals and create an immersive experience through my idea of incorporating biophilic design with technology; I found myself referring back to the recent surge in immersive art exhibits that I have seen popping up around London as examples of a similar experience that I wish to create in a hospitality setting. So, when I utilised the same method of explanation when talking to Richard recently, accompanied with my ongoing struggle of gaining a testing venue. Richard pointed out that if these art spaces already host similar technology to that I wish to utilise in my project and most art spaces have some kind of hospitality space which serves food and drink; why don’t I attempt to test my ideas in these spaces?
For me this was a big breakthrough moment and simply an angle I had completely overlooked. Consequently, my next task is to uncover suitable spaces hosting such immersive art exhibitions and that have hospitality facilities; and to them approach them to ask if it would be possible to test my ideas with them. I am in the process of curating a list of venues that fit these criteria, which I will explore in greater depth in my blog over the coming days. My plan is to not only email and call these venues, but to actually visits some of the immersive experiences myself over the coming days to hopefully be able to meet the people running the venue and form a personal bond with them. I also wish to gain inspiration from these immersive experiences for my project and to push to boundaries of what may be possible in the realm of technobiophilia.
Reflection:
Art spaces may prove very beneficial in testing the technology side of my concepts, but I am still keen to consider the more physical ideas I have around biophilic design and how they can be utilised to create dynamic spaces. Therefore, I will continue my quest in contacting hospitality venues to test in, as well as the art spaces which also host hospitality settings.
Bibliography
Lassen, N., Goia, F., Schiavon, S. and Pantelic, J., (2020) “Field investigations of a smiley-face polling station for recording occupant satisfaction with indoor climate.” Building and Environment, 185, p.107266.
Technobiophilia: nature and cyberspace, By Sue Thomas
Thomas coined the term technobiophilia, founded in her discovery that the utilisation of nature metaphors in internet culture was the result of biophilia (Thomas, 2013).
Technobiophilia – the innate attraction to life and lifelike processes as they appear in technology (Thomas, 2013).
Even through the crowds of technology facing the modern world, we are still drawn to nature and incorporating nature in the technological innovations in our lives. We even term technological developments after accepts of nature, such as storing data ‘in the cloud’ or your computer ‘getting a bug’ (Barreiros et al., 2018).
In the book Thomas (2013) states that technobiophilia practises and artefacts contribute to wellbeing via a tech-nature balance (Thomas, 2013). However, looking to critically analyse this finding, I wonder if utilising technology to connect with nature could produce the same benefits or even increased benefits, than incorporating natural design through standard Biophilic design such as planting, colour, textures, sounds etc. In summary, if we incorporate nature in technology, do we get the same wellbeing benefits from interacting with nature in this way or are the benefits slightly lowered or even heightened?
Relating This New Knowledge Into My Project
If technology does provide similar levels of benefits as more traditional or standard biophilic schemes, there is a large potential to utilise technology in my project. Technology could be utilised to develop a method of implementing nature into hospitality spaces in a fully immersive and easily changeable manner. For instance, natural scenes accompanied by their soundscapes and scents could be shown in restaurants instead of standard art work. Of course there is the cost element of this application to consider, as the technology needed may be expensive. However, if done on a rental basis of the technology in a trail to prove its efficacy and then if the concept proves value, an investment could be made by businesses into the needed technology.
This link of utilising technology in my project directly relates to key discussions had in my panel discussion with the biophilic experts. It was raised that technology is currently overlooked a lot in biophilic design, with designers falling into the trap of thinking that technology and nature need to be kept separate. Additionally, in the panel the vast importance of creating dynamic and changing spaces has on the success of continuously attracting customers to spaces, as many shames require refurbishment after a few years in order to modernise and keep customers engaged. Technology if successfully utilised in the way I am envisaging could create changeable, dynamic and evolving spaces that fully immerses customers in nature and consequently improving their wellbeing by re-connecting them with nature. Creating such spaces not only addresses the key points raised in my expert discussion, but also the needs of the hospitality professionals I have spoken to throughout the course of my project so far. I have learnt that hospitality spaces are generally receptive to including nature in their spaces, but they cannot afford large scale refurbishments nor can the afford to be closed for the time these refurbishments need to take place. Therefore, utilising technology which can be easily implemented into existing spaces or even utilise some of the existing technology they already have, such as speakers, could help to create an immersive natural experience in the space without obstructing the business and instead attract greater customers in.
Delving deeper in Thomas’s work around technobiopilia, it becomes apparent that she focuses on how technology could be utilised to enhance our experiences of nature or how nature can be brought more into our lives by technology via mobile tech such as smart phones, apps or wearables (Thomas, 2020). She wishes to develop a way of measuring the benefits to wellbeing that living a technobiophilic lifestyle can have. For example, an app or wearable tech that can measure heart rate changes based on different environments people are in (Thomas, 2020). Suggesting, my idea of developing immersive natural spaces may be a new and unusual take on her concept.
Reflections – the breakthrough moment
I feel that delving deeper into technobiophilia and looking at how to utilise technology in a beneficial way to connect people with nature has really been a breakthrough moment in my work. I believe trying to tackle re-connecting people to nature from this angle is so exciting and currently I can’t find it being done like this in any hospitality spaces which is such a groundbreaking thing for me. So far I have mainly been looking at new ways to combine design ideas that are partially out in the general field of biophilic design; but, this avenue feels new and even slightly liberating!
Next Steps:
I am looking to get in contact with Sue them stop discuss these concepts further over the coming week. I believe she was actually invited into class as a part of the guest speaker project so hopefully she will also be willing to assist in my work.
My big task over the coming weeks is to secure venues to begin testing my concepts in. I have a possible contact of a hospitality manager in Edinburgh, who seems keen but is yet to confirm if this keenness is more a reflection of their kindness. I also have contacts I have built through LinkedIn and Facebook groups that are hospitality managers, who I am reaching out to work with. However, last night I actually met a hospitality manager for the restaurant JOY at Notting Hill who seemed very interested in my work. I have been in contact with him today and I am hopeful something may come of that connection.
Bibliography
Barreiros, C., Veas, E. and Pammer, V., (2018) “Bringing nature into our lives.” In International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (pp. 99-109). Springer, Cham.
Thomas, S., 2013. Technobiophilia: Nature and cyberspace. A&C Black.
Thomas, S. (2020) “Technobiophilic Design Challenges for Developers” https://suethomasnet.wordpress.com/whatistechnobiophilia/designchallenges/
