TOOLS

LED & Laser cutter

TIMEFRAME

5 Days

TEAM

Zina Bazarbashi
Jae Pearl

Bridging Barriers

Instruction for Strangers: Bridging Barriers is a week long experimental project with a central aim at creating a public intervention that prompts strangers to interact with it, with as little instruction as possible.

Based on site research and observation we found that the Brooklyn bridge is a location that gathers a variety of people from different demographics. It is both visited as a tourist attraction, and wizzed through during many bikers’ commutes.

Goal & Audience

With this in mind, we wanted to create a message board that bridges the barriers of language, attempting to gather the varied demographics of the bridge to come up with a shared meaning of what it represents to them. We decided on using emojis, a universal visual language that both young and old understand!

Through multiple iterations, we landed on a final prototype:
A large light box that enabled people to jumble and iterate on other’s meanings and representations of the bridge. This created a reason for people to interact with one another, deciphering the meanings of different emoji combinations.

Process

First Iteration

Prompt: “This Bridge Represents______”
Medium: Sticker on Large Paper Poster.

This iteration was placed at the first arch of the Brooklyn Bridge, on the corner beside a street art vendor.
Pros: We got a decent amount of interaction.
Cons: It was difficult to setup.
The stickers were hard to find
// a better sorting method was necessary, and applied to final version.

Second Iteration

Prompt: "Hi” in 8 Different Languages.
Medium: Velcro on Felt.

We were tempted to explore a different prompt, and less permanent medium for Iteration 2, something that enabled people to interact with previous interactions (indirectly), and was easy to move and place in various locations.
Barely any pros: The only interaction was a child (when placed at children’s eye level).