2. Design inspirations

Cultural ritual in terms of direction

Another interesting design insight can be related to the religious ritual of praying. Like the social custom of bowing the cultural ritual of praying, (i.e. the Muslim tradition) also relates to a specific directional gesture (www.whyislam.org, 05.05.09).

The Muslim prayer ritual, which is over 1400 years old, is repeated five times a day toward Mecca by hundreds of millions of people all round the world. Carrying it out is not only highly spiritual, but connects each Muslim to all others around the world.(ibid)

When it is time to pray, Muslims need to be located in the direction of Mecca. In the case of being away from a Mosque in a new location, Muslims always carry on them a Mecca direction telling compass that is called qibla compass (sometimes also called qibla indicator). This compass helps such Muslims who are not available to visit Mecca to know the direction of Mecca at prayer times (ibid)

The concept of the Mecca direction telling compass is an interesting precedent for the design task at hand. As a contemporary form the Mecca compass could be translated into a long distance communication tool that indicates the direction of a desired location to feel a sense of connection between a place and a person living away.