People belong to different ethnicities, races, and cultures and follow various traditions. However, there is one thing that every single person has in common, and that is their need to excrete waste from their bodies. Can space facilitate conversations amongst contrasting people without forcing face-to-face social interaction by just sensing the of presence of another person? Or by creating inter-dependency among people who are using the space? This project acts as a critique on a generic public space, the public toilet where no one really wants to sense another person’s presence and challenges the universal standards created for such public spaces.
The project questions every aspect of using a toilet like how one sits, how one uses toilet paper, or the proper way to angle one’s body while letting out waste. Adjustable floor levels and toilet bowl angles allow multiple ways in which people can use the toilet. The sink in turn acts as a central attraction point where the collected rainwater falls and people in different stalls are connected through the same sink and water sounds. The other elements that create conversations between people using the adjacent toilet at the same time include the use of toilet paper and paper towels, which promote the idea ‘more you use, more you expose’. The features that help connect the interiors to outside activities include the baby changing station, the lock of the toilet and the brick grouts on the curved surface.
The exhibition included a virtual reality experience to understand what a person sees while using the toilet.
