Capsule is an experiential system that explores the time and spaces of contemporary mobility, responding to a widespread perception of movement as anonymous, purely functional, and emotionally empty. The project originates from a research-driven investigation into how Generation Z experiences mobility today, combining qualitative interviews and quantitative data analysis. From this process emerged mēnēm, a digital archive designed to collect, preserve, and connect fragments of lived experience. Conceived as an anagram of mnēmē (memory), mēnēm transforms personal traces into a shared memory system, giving form to what usually disappears in transit: emotions, moments, and small happinesses [Marc Augé].
The experience begins with an activation marketing phase designed to introduce the archive and generate anticipation within mobility spaces. During this phase, physical Capsules are installed in stations and function as access points to the archive’s landing page. Through a countdown system, they create a shared sense of waiting, curiosity, and hype around the opening of Mēnēm. In dialogue with posters, flyers, and stickers distributed throughout mobility spaces, as well as digital content shared on social platforms, the Capsules make the presence of the archive visible and recognizable, anticipating its activation. Once the countdown ends, the archive becomes accessible and fully usable. All communication supports — physical and digital — actively engage users and invite them to contribute a personal trace to the archive. Each contribution, once uploaded, is preserved and connected with the traces left by others, collectively adding meaning to a time and space previously perceived as anonymous and purely functional.
Mēnēm takes shape as a space-other (a heterotopia in Foucault’s sense) where fragments of lived experience, such as images, sounds, words, objects, and videos, are gathered and preserved precisely where nothing usually remains: on trains, in stations, and within spaces of passage. This digital dimension does not aim to accelerate mobility or increase its efficiency. Instead, it inhabits the time of the journey to symbolically slow it down, transforming transit into experience and the non-place into a space rich with meaning. The archive is accessible exclusively within spaces of mobility, allowing each individual to remain within their intimate bubble or to interact with shared memories. The archive can be explored through temporal criteria, keywords, or connections between memories. Once a personal trace is uploaded, it becomes part of the user’s Mēnēm passport, a personal space where individual memories and their relationships with other traces can be viewed. In this way, Capsule restores meaning to the suspended time of mobility, transforming it into inhabited time — capable of welcoming presences, stories, and significance.
TEAM
Marco Arrigoni, Monica Battaglia, Cosimo Gambarelli, Federico Porro, Anna Schnitzer, Serena Troisi
NEXT Mobility, in collaboration with Trenord
Politecnico di Milano, Master’s Degree in Communication Design
Final Synthesis Lab, C2
Final Synthesis Lab, C2
Professors: Francesca Piredda, Mariana Ciancia, Marco Ronchi, Katia Goldoni, Silvia Barozzi, Gabriele Carbone
