Losæter is a community/place that can feel difficult to understand for first-time visitors. This project explores how a nudging system could make Losæter more welcoming, while helping volunteers and city farmers focus on the activities and care of the place.
Written by Marine Ladaique, Spatial Design
01 / The Brief
From a hidden place to a shared place
Losæter is a community farming and cultural space in Oslo, shaped by city farmers, volunteers, organised activities and the people who regularly take part in them. It is not a conventional public space with a clear entrance, fixed programme or obvious rules. Instead, much of what happens there is carried by the people who know the place and understand how to participate. This works well for regular visitors, but it can be difficult for someone arriving for the first time. A new visitor may wonder: Where is Losæter? Am I allowed to enter? What can I do here? Who can I talk to? What is happening today? The project therefore looks at the gap between the people who already understand Losæter and those who are discovering it for the first time.
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02 / The Person
Marine Ladaique
I am Marine Ladaique, a fourth-year spatial design student. I am in an exchange programme in Oslo for a semester but I do my studies in Paris. My approach to design is strongly connected to the relationship between people and the spaces they use. I am interested in how small spatial and graphic interventions can change the way a place is understood and experienced.
03 / The Motivation
Welcoming without taking over
I chose this project because Losæter raises a simple but important design question: how can we help the core volunteers to delegate new arrivals by using a nudging system? I was interested in the tension between a community that already has its own culture and new people who do not yet know how to enter it.
04 / Past and Present
First arrival
The Past and Present gigamap maps the current situation around Losæter and focuses on the people who experience the place differently. At the centre are the regular users: city farmers and volunteers who organise activities, garden and welcome new people. Around them are different types of newcomers, from people who hear about Losæter through word of mouth to people who simply come across the place. The map highlights a key difference between these groups. Regulars already have knowledge of the place, its activities and its social codes. New visitors often need information that is currently communicated informally or directly by another person.
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05 / Futures and Interventions
From lost to belonging
The Futures and Interventions gigamap translates these observations into a desired future for Losæter. Instead of focusing on one single object, it explores a system of small interventions that work together: maps at the entrance, welcoming signs, named places, written rules, information about activities, signs connected to groups, and a visual identity that makes Losæter recognisable as a public space. The interventions respond to three main questions: How can people understand what Losæter is? How can they find their way through it? And how can new visitors become more independent while still feeling welcomed?
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This project was developed as part of Module 1 of Systems Oriented Design: Catalysing Desirable Transformations, an interdisciplinary master’s course at AHO’s Institute of Design.
