Now the restrictions and regulations of the UK lockdown are being eased, we are all in our different ways processing and reflecting on the strange months between the end of March and June, a bewildering time.
At Social Life, we created maps about our experience of lockdown to understand how we arranged and structured our lives, constructing new routines and adapting to our limited and very local lives and our new focus on our homes and neighbourhoods. We are all London based, but live in different areas, three of us are south Londoners, two live in the north of the city. Making maps has helped us understand how our lives changed and what it is that has helped us cope. We are sharing these now as we move into a new phase of London life, possibly one that will be more stable and predictable, but who knows?
Our first map: Jessica's shows the walks she took around her local area in early April, and discovered new places and experiences in a neighbourhood she had thought that she knew well.
Christina's map centres on her home, and like Jessica's illustrates different routes, the bike rides she took around the area with her family.
Olimpia's map is global - linking her three homes in Queens, in New York City, north London where she lives now and Pitesti in Romania.
Nicola's map shows her connections with parks, the new importance of local bakeries and the sense of green from living in south London through a sunny spring.
Our final map from Jonah map also shows the outings he took and describes how the time he spent in different places changed through lockdown.
Like everyone, we are going to be reflecting on how this peculiar time has shaped our lives and the world we live in for some time to come.
Soon we will be publishing the research we have been working on through lockdown, with Kaizen and the Quality of Life Foundation, based on in-depth phone interviews with people across the UK. Many of our personal themes were reflected in these conversations. We're going to continue to capture the impact of the pandemic and its aftershock in Southwark over the next year, as well as in South Acton and Croydon. We will continue to use maps to help reveal the patterns and daily practices of our lives.