SOLACE DREAM
David van Doesburg
Ilya Flipsen
Tsjeng Wammes
Zoë Bolleboom
"How can we use an embodied experience to make people relax by stimulating their senses?"
WHY
That is our design question, which was created during the most lonely time of the year: the Covid-19 lockdown. Many people were noticed to be missing that relaxing feeling of cuddling their loved ones. Because of the lockdown, it is not possible to have the physical contact you normally could have. This can cause to make a lot of people feel more depressed and less motivated in their daily life. Cuddling with a loved one produces hormones in your body that positively influences your mood and social behavior. Because of this, cuddling could be seen as a serious need for many people for their mental state.
*image: installation Solace Dream
HOW
With our design, we use ASMR because it produces the same hormones as cuddling. The user is given a heart rate sensor and a sweat sensor. In addition to soothing music, there will also be sounds that are triggered by your heartbeat, for example. As well as the visuals the user sees, which will interact with the rhythm of your heart. This will bring the user into a kind of meditation that will calm him or her down. Fog will be present in the room where the user is located. It's for a pleasant smell and a dreamy touch. The inside of the room is also filled with dreamy elements so that anyone would feel calm and safe in it.
*image: inside Solace Dream
All this together will cause hormones in the body to be generated and the user will come to rest completely. No actual hug is made, but the feeling is simulated.
The user enters a different kind of world, through which the outside world gets forgotten for a moment.
A Solace Dream
WHAT
*image: visuals from Solace Dream
