I mentioned Sleep No More as an example of a curated experience in class, but I think I will actually choose Embassy Suites. Embassy Suites is a chain of hotels and growing up they were the places we stayed for band trips and soccer tournaments- anything that required piling a bunch of kids in one room. The selling point of ES (I don’t think anyone calls it that) is that all the rooms are suites, so parents had a space to read or watch tv and could still make sure we went to sleep at a reasonable time, or the pull-out couch in the second room could be used for 5 or 6 more people. The layout of the hotel is also open to the center. Rooms have full-length windows facing a shared corridor overlooking an atrium. The parts of this experience that I felt were meant for me is the faux authenticity of the space. You’re meant to feel like you’re at a resort with climbing vines and greenery (fake), a water feature or river (fake and highly chlorinated), and the feeling of being in a shared space as you could see people walking past the room through the huge windows. Growing up in a rural part of NJ where no over ever just walked past our house, coupled with the fact that I knew many people in the hotel (class trips), made me imagine what it might be like to live in a city with landscaping and people and the ability to take a glass elevator (lots of glass!) down to a cafe (fake) to have chex mix with friends. I’m not sure if the designers of this space had all of this in mind, but their choices did influence my experience in the space.
Participation = Passive. Connection = Immersion