The reason why I am sharing this story with you is that I would like to illustrate how important it is to talk and listen to people in order to get quality insights. People-centered research can be a key factor in designing meaningful services, products or even (urban) environments.
This was a project named Ritakville, initiated by a group of students during my studies of design at HDK – The Academy of Design and Crafts in Gothenburg, Sweden. We applied an interventionist method, researching a square called Kvilletorget in the northern part of Gothenburg/Sweden, which is also marked as a so called "problem area". During one month several public sketching events took place on the square, initiated and organized by seven students. Their purpose was to investigate the social life and the challenges of the place.
By inviting all people in the neighborhood to join we asked several question such as “How can we transform this place together?". The outcome is an abstract containing a rich scope of wishes, thoughts, recommendations, complaints and suggestions in the form of sketches, that serves as a foundation to uncover potential opportunity areas through design and co-creation for this specific place.