Category
Service Design
Duration
Oct 2024-Jan2025
Tools
Figma
Adobe
Overview
Partnering with Canal Dream (CIC), The Floating Garden, and The Floating Classroom — three UK canal-based charities — this project co-designed with London canal residents to rethink how water-based communities can not just exist but actually thrive. Through immersive participatory methods, we explored lived experiences and developed a designed social toolkit to support new live-aboard residents while fostering inclusive, future-ready canal living.
Role
I led the research, like psycho-geographic mapping sessions, to uncover hidden dynamics along the canals. Also as the main designer of the toolkit service, I facilitated participatory workshops to co-create with residents and local charities. Taking a service design lens, I used visual sensemaking to narrow down insights and shape a future-facing model for inclusive community development on water.
Challenge
Water-based communities face a mix of physical and social challenges — from having to move their boats every two weeks, to dealing with seasonal depression, isolation, and a lack of mental health support. New residents often struggle to navigate unspoken norms, and there's little inclusive infrastructure or onboarding support. All of this is made worse by uncertainty around the long-term future of urban waterways as viable living spaces.
Solution
Positioning ourselves as a new canal-based CIC (Community Interest Company — a type of social enterprise that uses its assets for public good), we developed a social toolkit designed for both new and long-time canal boaters. Alongside this, we created a co-creation model that empowers live-aboard residents to connect, collaborate, and shape their canal communities on their own terms.
#Primary research
Through our conversations, it became clear that while CRT aims to ensure fair use of the waterways, continuous cruisers often feel unfairly targeted by regulations and enforcement. Many expressed frustration over the lack of suitable mooring spaces and the pressure to keep moving and raising basic living cost, which disrupts their daily lives and sense of belonging.
Local canal community groups also raised concerns about overcrowding and the strain transient boats place on shared resources. Continuous cruisers typically have no fixed address and are required to relocate their boats every 14 days. This lifestyle demands a high level of self-sufficiency, managing essentials like water, waste, and electricity on their own.
Our interviews and site observations revealed realities far more difficult than what desk research suggested. A recurring issue was the lack of communication between neighbours. For instance, when boaters are double-moored and need to move the next day, they often leave handwritten notes in windows, but whether the other party sees them is uncertain.
We also heard a heartbreaking story: during winter, a woman’s boat caught fire. Her neighbours didn’t have her contact information, and with no way to reach her, they were forced to let the situation unfold. After a long day of work, she returned to find everything destroyed.
Current Stakeholder Map
This is how Continuous Cruisers said …
Canal, originally built as private waterways belonging to local industries during the Industrial Revolution. Over time, as railways took over, canals became quieter, turning into natural habitats and playgrounds. The Canal & River Trust (CRT) now carries out the main management.
In modern London, canals have taken on a new life. With more people choosing to live or work on boats for different reasons, these waterways have become not just a natural space but also a vibrant community. There are mainly two types of residents, Permanent Moorers and Continuous boaters.
This project focuses on live-aboard boaters and tries to figure out how to make this unique community, made by them, more friendly and sustainable. Based on the current stakeholder map we made, we gained insight into how this unique canal system operates.
After speaking with several CRT workers and local canal community groups, we discovered there are underlying tensions between them—particularly affecting continuous boaters, who are required to move their boats twice a week.
Research
#Methodology
To better understand the experiences of canal boaters, we combined psychogeography mapping through observational walks as well as boater's perspective participatory tools such as a graffiti wall and emotional mapping, which enabled boaters to share their daily realities and cases directly.
reasons of similars
causes of conflicts
interesting locations
surprise findings
understand backgrounds
find opportunities
new perspectives
boater’s emotional map
Psycho-geography map
Observation
Empathise
As a researcher
from our own perspectives
insights of canal systems
As a canal residents
from boaters’ perspectives
stories and emotions of canal life
Through this collaborative research, we identified two key challenges:
firstly, that life on a canal boat is physically, emotionally, and mentally demanding;
Secondly, that the bonds between boaters are weakening due to a lack of dedicated spaces for connection.
Given these findings, we have chosen to focus on strengthening community ties among boaters. By addressing the absence of communal spaces, we hope to foster greater support networks and improve the overall wellbeing of those living on the canals.
We asked ourselves:
How might we help live-aboard boaters to develop stronger connections with each other, resulting in a more resilient and uplifting community?
Jessica
Age: 27
Female Artist
A new London canal boater, she's been living alone on a narrowboat for two months to save money. It’s her first time living solo, but she enjoys solving challenges and learning new skills.
Also
Because of winter….
Social ties are eroding
Boats feel smaller in winter with added heating gear.
Cold keeps boaters indoors, not in shared spaces.
Some feel unsafe and experience mental isolation, especially alone.
#Activity Prototype Testing
To refine our service, we conducted multiple rounds of prototyping:
With Students
We tested the design materials, flows and mechanics, gathering feedback and opinions on each part of the event flow to improve the overall user experience.
With Real Boaters
The event was warmly received by participating boaters. It successfully fostered social connection, and many boaters expressed strong interest in future participation.
As part of the project, we created a fictional CIC (Community Interest Company) as an external, community-facing brand to support London’s live-aboard boaters. Rather than presenting ourselves as researchers or designers coming in to “solve” something, we acted as a new canal organisation that connects, and co-creates with the community from the inside out, developing the future canal strategy with them.
Through a shared community spirit and seasonal gatherings, the place offers boaters a safe and warm environment, collectively shaping their group identity.
This social toolkit is made up of two main parts:
1. The Card Game
Designed around the themes of self-discovery and social connection, the card game helps boaters quickly form bonds and spark conversations. Each canal personality type is paired with a unique animal character, adding a playful and symbolic layer to interactions and creating rich opportunities for dialogue.
2. The Open Activity Format
Beyond the game, participants co-decide what they want to create or explore together, such as making floating keychains, crafting candles, hosting storytelling sessions, or designing family-friendly educational activities.
These shared experiences build on the initial connections formed through the game, deepening relationships and creating lasting memories.
Final outcomes
Prototype 1 with RCA students
Testing the usability of the toolkit and room for optimisation
"It’s a good way to ice break and start conversation."-one participant
Prototype 2 with real boaters
Observe boaters’ engagement with the toolkit
“Cozy, warm, supportive, positive, It’s very good experience for me.”---One boater
#Developing Strategy
Over time, The Floating Den supports boaters in building their own community and expressing their cultural identity — not by leading, but by empowering. We wish our project could be the groundwork that grows into a distributed ecosystem on the water which could empower more boaters in the future.
In Stage 1, The Floating Den is a prototype: a playful but intentional prompt for boaters to connect and reconnect by offering a shared language through multiple interactions.
In Stage 2, The Floating Den acts as a soft interface—bridging canal residents with institutional potential. It becomes a visible, shared platform, entering the space as collaborators rather than service providers.
In Stage 3, the model expands outward. Boaters step into co-leadership roles, forming Boater Partnerships that activate more distributed, peer-led hubs. The Floating Den becomes a connective node in a growing mesh of local actors, including canal organisations, and even curious public. It’s no longer “an intervention” but a culture.
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One of the most valuable lessons I’ve taken from this project is the shift in mindset from “designer as problem-solver” to “designer as partner.” As a designer, I used to focus heavily on outcomes, like tangible deliverables, touchpoints, and impact. But through this project, I realised that the process itself holds just as much, if not more, value.
The way we interact with users, through listening, co-creating, and building trust, not as subjects, but as equals, fundamentally shaped our work. We stepped into their world, experienced their lives, and did our best to truly empathise. It’s not about designing for them, but with them.
Perhaps the real impact isn’t what you launch, but how many seeds you plant.
Reflection
In team with:
Akane Nemoto, Rachel Li, Vivien Fergusson, Sijia Li
Special thanks to:
