start

- my goal?
Meeting new people can be difficult, especially if your life is set up in a way that you always meet the same people. This can be caused by a number of circumstances. Maybe you had the same job for a long time, you don’t do a sport which allows you to socialize afterwards, or you simply can’t find the time or don’t know the means how to meet new people. You might even, put simply, be a little scared. All of this I want to solve by creating a space where strangers can come to meet new and interesting people, safely.

- What?
What I want to create in the Schiecentrale is a space where strangers can comfortably and safely meet other strangers in a cozy, relaxing and safe environment. The worldwide pandemic has pushed all of us apart and when I look around, the number one complaint I hear is that people want to meet new people. Before this was done at parties or when you went out for a night, this has been taken away from us and therefore we want it back.
You might ask then that when this pandemic is over that my bar will no longer be necessary as meeting new people won’t have to be done specifically at a place made with that thought in mind. But meeting new people and striking up new friendships, even before the pandemic has shown difficult for a lot of people, especially at older age. This means that places where new friendships, relations and other connections can be made will always appeal to the people.

- How?
I want to achieve this by making a relatively small bar with a modular seating arrangement. The seats will be able to move at the command of an operator. The operator can move seats at their will, forcing the occupants of the seat to a person or persons.
To avoid a conflict-of-interest costumers will have to state the reason of their visit to the operator, this will be symbolized with a colored light on the seats. That way the operator can easily identify people with the same interests and put them opposite each other.
Small talk is defined by the Oxford Languages as: “polite conversation about unimportant or uncontroversial matters, especially as engaged in on social occasions.” This is the exact opposite of what I want at the bar. Conversations here should hold meaning and leave the costumers with a feeling of having real meaningful conversations with people, rather than just talking about the weather or that long delayed flight you once had that nobody cares about. This will be done by making a selection of thought- provoking, deep and controversial questions which will be put in a small box on the table.

- Why?
As stated before, we as people are being pushed apart, which goes against our nature. We are a social animal and need the interactions we have with others for a healthy mind. loneliness can cause a number of diseases and disorders like: depression, sleep disorders, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and mental/emotional issues (Cigna, 2018). I want to offer everybody the chance to go out there and feel less lonely.

BAR SCHIECENTRALE TERM 1.3 - PEPIJN VAN ELTEN

The cornerstones of my bar:

- Safety
- conversation
- atmosphere
- modular seats

- Safety

“Men's biggest online dating fear is their date will be fat, while women are more concerned about meeting up with a murderer.”(Daily Mail, 2014). As the quote suggests, meeting strangers does come with its concerns and worries. I want to mitigate these feelings by developing a system which allows its users to discreetly notify bar employees of their situation, that way eerybody in the bar is safe and protected.

- conversations

https://www.vox.com/2015/7/7/8903123/small-talk

Small talk is boring and gets you nowhere (my opinion) despite this it is still one of the most common type of talks i have because of my job and dating. Small talk is necessary because most people will not tell their life stories or ask deep questions to people if the setting does not allow it. I am going to change this in my bar.

- athmosphere

With the concept of No Small Talk in mind, I need to create a setting that will help to loosen people to make them feel less tense about their environment which, in turn, will lead them to have better converstations. the more comfortable someone feels, the less distractions there are therefor giving more energy and brainpower to the conversation.

What should i keep in mind when designing the bar focussing on comfort?
- colours & materials
- seating position & texture
- light

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3024543/
https://www.lehigh.edu/~mhb0/EnvtoPerson.pdf

- meeting

With my three cornerstone ideas in mind, now comes to last cornerstone idea and final step to actually meeting new people (the whole point behind my bar). As we have established, the bar is focussed on safety, therefor we can take away that people have no reason to be scared of walking up to someone and starting a conversation. But for some this can still be a mammoth task.
I want to completely negate this by taking away the power people have over choosing who they talk to. Now for some this might seem scary, but it opens doors to meet people you would otherwise not have talked to of you choose yourself because oftentimes people are not what they seem on the outside and usally they are much more interesting then they might look.

How will i do this?
By creating a modular seating arrangement. The floor will be made out of Celluveyor. This is a Omnidirectional Cellular Conveyor. This invention was originally designed for revolutionizing conveyor belts in warehouses, wehereas before the cargo could only move in one direction when now they can move in every direction, but they can easily be adjusted for the purpose i have in mind.

The floor of the seating area in the bar will be made entirely out of these hexagonal cells (with exception to some small pathways for servers). On this floor will be put a number of small, one person sized platforms. These platforms contain a seat and half of a table. An operator (using the old turbine control panel) will then be able to move the platform, with its occupant, to another one. Thus slightly forcing two strangers to sit across from eachother which, hopefully, sparks a fruitful conversation.

https://news.stanford.edu/news/2013/may/jurafsky-mcfarland-dating-050613.html

Dan McFarland and Dan Jurafsky analyzed four minute conversations of heterosexual couples in a speed dating encounter to find out why some people felt a connection whilst others did not.
"One of the key features of a community, social network or relationship is the sense that it's meaningful, that there is some kind of force behind the relationship. We wanted to get at what the essence of the connection is, what makes people feel like they bonded."" (Standfort Report, Dan McFarlane, 2013)

In this paper it is said that a succesfull encounter (meaning both parties would like to go on a date) mostly occured when:
- using appreciative language and sympathy
- women reported liking it when men interupted them, that means finishing sentences and demonstrating understanding. (and not interrupting them to redirect the conversation.)
- asking a lot of questions was seen as negative (women used is to keep te conversation going and men because they had nothing to say)
- varying your speech (louder and softer)
- shared stories

Now, I can't make all customers at the bar masters in small talk by using the research mentioned in this paper. What i can do however is make sure i give the stimulation where this conversation behaviour can naturally occur.

Conversation cards with deep, meaningful and thought-provoking can bring a conversation alive and will clearly show if two individuals feel a 'click'.

- colours

https://www.verywellmind.com/color-psychology-2795824

As we are promoting conversation, the atmosphere surrounding the guests of the bar has a large influence on them. Colours influence us all, whilst they remain somewhat subjective, some colour effects have universal meaning. Creating the bar with just one colour is of course not a good idea for the goal i have in mind. A combination of colours that invoke a feeling of comfort and confidence is what is most suited in my situation. All this boils down to a usage of brown and green, both of these are colours mostly associated with nature. Which is a place nearly all people associate with positive emotions.

- materials

https://www.re-thinkingthefuture.com/fresh-perspectives/a1275-how-do-materials-affect-human-psychology/

The two colours mentioned above does not mean that simply a wall will be painted green or brown. It means that the materials of the interior should have the quality of this colour. Think of plants and wood. "Designing efficient spaces that reduce the psychosomatic system, anxiety and stress level, fatigue, or any other sort of physical and mental discomfort can be encouraged by using materials like bamboo" (How do materials affect human psychology, re-thinkingthefuture.com, 2020)

- textures

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332564189_Emo
tions_associated_with_different_textures_during_touch

In a study done by Marina Iosifyan (University of St Andrews) and Olga Korolkova (Brunel university London) 108 participants, whilst blind-folded, where given 21 textures, one at a time. then they had to associate the texture with one of six emotions: happiness, fear, disgust, anger, surpise and sadness. Naturally i want to use textures that invoke the positive emotions of the participants. (see image on the right)

- seating position

https://www.labroots.com/trending/neuroscience/12469/sitting-straight-improve-mental-focus

https://www.mid-day.com/lifestyle/health-and-fitness/article/How-posture-improves-concentration-on-studies-18973177

https://www.lugo.co.uk/blogs/blog/top-tips-for-choosing-contract-bar-stools

Sitting up straight and mantaining a correct posture helps people with their concentration. A study done by Dutch behavioral scientist states that three main things happen when we focus on our posture. When we sit up straight we are more likely to remember positive memories or think of positive things in general, says this experiment.

For my bar this means that the seats will not be large lounge seats in which guests can sink and feel like they are floating. instead, i am goign to use barstools (and no, not just because i am designing a bar) Bar stools allow a comfortable and actvive seating position.

- light

https://www.tcpi.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Psychological-Impact-of-Light-and-Color.pdf

in order to create the atmosphere that helps people relax we need low, non-uniform light and warm colours. this type of lighting makes people feel familiar with an otherwise unfamiliar space. When people enter a strange space, one of the first things they do is look for things they recognize, this helps them adapt to the space, which in turn helps in feeling confident and comfortable.