The Idea

This week I’ve been looking into social issues that are currently presented within my locality.

Although there were many interesting routes to take, the idea of using to colour to bring back life into our everyday environments really resonated with me.

I feel that colour has a massive effect on our mental state and that it just doesn’t make sense for us to continue to choose to live in dull, blank, grey spaces. So what better way to combat this than with paint?

 

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Research

At this point I knew I wanted to tackle the problem by painting buildings, walls and shops in colour – however I wasn’t sure how to go about this. As if I were to simply pick a colour myself and paint the town – I feel that could be just be as demoralising as leaving it the way it is as I would be stripping the community of the their choice and opinions of how they want their environments to look.

I really liked Hefin Jones approach to design as a lot of it was based around communication and the sharing of ideas and perspectives. I feel this is an excellent way of including the community within the design which ultimately leads to a design that is more fitting and welcomed within the community it’s being built for. Building a design that is to be tailored to a specific group of people without acknowledging the people it would effect is essentially like trying to fit a tailored suit to a person who isn’t there. It just wouldn’t fit as well.

Also, by including more people you are allowing for a fictional space for ideas to form to be expanded, this could lead to some interesting perspectives and ideas that may not of been achievable alone.

I also really liked the proposal of having a reflection tool to assist during projects, and although Hefin did state that it may not be suitable for everything, as not everything needs to be questioned/changing, I still think this is an excellent tool to use during the design process. For it to work, however you must stop and Listen first – listen to the people and if there’s an issue you are then prompted to reflect and resolve it, rather than just assume where problems lay and fix them without any prior knowledge or insight.

This is an element I’m wanting to bring into this weeks project, through inclusion I could find myself being made aware of other wants or needs of the community leading to the expansion of my core idea.

After speaking with Joe, I was made aware of the Let’s Colour project, sponsored by Delux. This project is very similar to my idea, as they use colour to transform communities all across the world. I absolutely loved this idea and found their social experiments really interesting – it just goes to show how much of an impact colour has on us – whether we’re aware of it or not.

In attempts to find direct associations with colour and the happiness of a community, I came across this map from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) which reveals which areas are the happiest, most miserable, anxious and have the highest and lowest levels of life satisfaction.

I found this fascinating and it actually helped me prove my point as it shows that the majority of cities and urban locations where found to have the highest anxiety rating. Whereas places like Pembrokeshire or Lancaster, which are both full of colour and nature, scored extremely low on the anxiety scale.

 

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Proposal – Colour Engagement

Colour is something we neglect, even though it is proven to have a large impact on our mental health. Whether we’re aware of it or not, colour can cause intense switches of emotions, impacting our behaviours and moods – further reactions to colour can be biological, such as releasing serotonin and lowering blood pressure.

So why is it we build grey environments for us to live and commute within? Through this campaign, I aim to bring colour back into our lives, starting with the buildings that we live, work and shop within.

To do this, I intend to start with individual communities. As this project will be impacting the entire community, I want everyone to take part in this process. I plan to introduce a “canvas” – this will be a large blank area upon a local wall with a simple question posed “what is our communities’ colour?”. Paint will be provided so the participants can then paint a swatch of their desired colour. Ultimately, I’d want this to lead to several communities creating their own palettes, leading to the connection of stories & relationships.

Community participation is going to be pivitol to this campaign, as without their input the wall will be blank, leaving the choice of the communities’ colour to fall to the few rather than the many.