ABSTRACT
Publicness is an experience of social contexts in which moments of co-awareness can support various types of human-to-human interactions. In situations of publicness, an individual gives up some control over their body and their environment in order to receive some benefit. Notions of publicness extend into the idea of public life where social activity occurs in accessible spaces that support interaction between people through observation or engagement. We often think of publicness and privacy as two discrete opposite states, but these concepts are really two ends of a gradient. In the case of the physical environment, most spaces are neither fully public nor entirely private but somewhere between the two. For urban design, significant priority is given towards the publicness side of the gradient. Publicness is also based on shared spaces that tolerate different interests and behaviours of diverse groups of people. The basis of publicness is accessibility and equitable experience.
