A Table on the Beach: Probing Odd Invitations by Scaling Conspicuity

Abstract

Everyday public life is filled with fleeting opportunities for social connection, yet designing for such spontaneous encounters can be an elusive challenge. Building on Odd Invitations, defamiliarised objects that invite exploratory engagement without explicit instruction, we investigate how such invitations can mobilise social traction within a given socio-cultural setting. Following a research-through-design approach, we deployed six lo-fi invitations involving a defamiliarising table at beaches in Sydney, progressively scaling their conspicuity to probe how strangers transition from spectator to participant. Analysing these encounters through Participation Gestalt, we show how, for Odd In..