Costa Rica is a Central American country with a strong family tradition. In-person reunions between immediate and extended family and friends are commonplace. Virtual engagement is also a fundamental part of their weekly social interaction using social media and messaging applications to share stories, articles, and conversations. As a fast-developing country with a growing culture for use of technological platforms, some family traditions are changing in order to encompass a more modern and city-centered lifestyle. Due to this, family stories that are told in an oral way, maybe neglected and disappear with time.

Utilizing the concept of oral tradition and storytelling we wondered, what if the reunion of modern Costa Rican families was marked by a ritual of oral storytelling?

‘Tangible Story’ was our approach to revive the traditional oral storytelling rituals and inspire contemporary families to think about the way we communicate today and to deepen their connection with their families.

Tangible Story consists of two devices. The transmitter and the receiver. Transmitters are meant to be kept at home for use whenever a family member wants to share a story. They can record them and it will be uploaded to a cloud repository. Once a story arrives to the repository, it will be redirected to a receiver device in one of the family member’s houses.

A light pattern signals the arrival of a new story. A person can push in the center of the device to hear the recorded memory, which will be deleted after it is played. The decision of letting the story fade away or preserving it by re-recording it into their own transmitter and re-sharing it, relies entirely on the family member. With this, family members make a conscious decision to keep their family legacy and stories alive.

In today’s society, our relationship with technology is based on immediacy. We expect both fast responses from our technology and technology expects fast responses from us. This has also come to play in the way we communicate with loved ones since the majority of our communication platforms are based on those same fast feedback loops. Tangible Story is our way of exploring slow and purposeful communication devices, where users need to actively participate, creating meaningfulness and connection by the action itself. We believe that by allowing families to keep their stories circulating and alive, they are creating an inheritance for their future generations.