GEN Z AND THEIR OCCUPATION OF SPACE

“For some time now, the first day of the year seems to be growing into a bizarre ritual For
Delhi wallahs. Droves of people from all parts of the city begin to gravitate towards the central
vista in New Delhi from around mid-day. Those unable to reach the coveted open space
around India Gate – in fact a poor imitation by Mr. Lutyens of the Champs-Elysees and the
Arc de Triomphe of Paris – satisfy themselves with ice cream, popcorn and balloons,
convincing themselves that they’re having a good time.”
THE WIRE, Let’s Reclaim Delhi’s Public Spaces to Celebrate in Diversity

Introduction
According to Forbes (2015) Generation Z is the cohort after the Millennials, defined as those
born from the mid-1990s to the early 2000s. This is the first generation that from the beginning
has grown up with a supercomputer in her pocket. YouTube, Snap Chat, Instagram, Siri and
Alexa, they consume information in a frictionless, snackable format. They’re have been growing
up in online worlds with a wealth of information at their disposal. Delhi, being an amalgamation
of cultures and ethnicity has immense potential in changing the face of the country and GenZ
are the productive generation for the coming two decades. This generation might be glued to
technology, but is less boxed in with the advantage of information on their finger tips and
global connectivity. This doesn't deny the threats of a more ideological and tribal political
context: technology has fragmented people into their own bubbles and echo chambers. So is
their perception on gender, religion, architecture and spaces are extremely fluid and different
from any other generations? And do we have to serve this creative and perceptive future of
this world with the specifically tailored spaces they entail?

How do millennials experience their daily life?

The idea and perception of a house has changed. The concept of a permanent residence is
fading away. This generation is more interested to migrate like a Great White Pelican across
coasts and experience different atmospheres rather than have their name on the door. They
desire more temporary private spaces and prefer renting furniture over buying furniture which
has paved the success of companies like Furlenco and Rentickle.
It’s a generation brimming with prodigious creativity and content creation. This has brought a
colossal change to the 9-5 desk jobs and hence the work spaces. They enjoy space to
collaborate, they like to have a sense of community, where they can just spend time with
people they meet, or their friends. We might call this massively scaling phenomenon with more
people in coworking space. GenZ will work and live with unprecedented automation. And for
them, space at work is as important as work. 47% GenZ’s list fun working environment in top
two factors for a job alongside flexibility.
If Millennials made cities safe for bicycles, GenZ will experience cities as a new playground:
sharing cars and using self-driving vehicles, they’ll spend time in a more efficient way, will
socialize. High profiting and market changing companies today like Uber and Ola are the results
of GenZ choosing the idea of shared ownership. They have a high appetite for constant variety
and change, so it becomes important to build environments that sate this hunger. To decode
this, we must critically analyze and understand how GenZ thinks, interacts and occupy spaces.

Direction of Approach
We need to look at GenZ not just as a generation but as a set of new behaviors and attitudes
about how the world works that help us shape our responses to stay current, competitive and
relevant. As human psychology is the basis of architecture, it is only natural that architecture
evolves like humans do. Planning for public spaces should be done for the future productive
generations as they will be the major users for the next ten to fifteen years. Factors like
individual experience, environmental effects and political scenarios play a major role in
influencing the behavior of GenZ. This technologically innate generation thus provides a
challenge for architects. Another aspect of this challenge could be residing with the western
influences over Indian culture. The basis of this research will be to identify the important
aspects that help set a benchmark for the design of public spaces for future generations.

Research questions

 Understanding the behavior and attitude of GenZ with regard to spaces, including but
not limited to impact of e-commerce, religious and cultural patterns and time
 Understanding the concept of ownership in GenZ
 Understanding the boundaries of the public spaces in regard to Indian context
 Identify important aspects in the public space design according to gen z needs