London Under the Microscope Asset

London Under the Microscope

Nine Million Stories, One Shared Map

London Under the Microscope Asset

London Under the Microscope

Nine Million Stories, One Shared Map

CLIENT

Museum of London

SERVICES

Data film Immersive installation Sonification

RECOGNITIONS

Brighton Digital Festival, Premiere Kyoto Global Design Awards, Gold Core77 Design Awards Permanent collection, Museum of London

How did the coronavirus transform London?

Commissioned by the Museum of London and supported by Arts Council England, we created a digital time capsule of the city’s first pandemic year. The aim was not just to chart events and map data, but to give Londoners a way to relive and reflect on their individual and collective experience.

London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset

Challenge

Every Londoner lived the pandemic differently. The challenge was to hold those nine million stories together without flattening them. We designed a layered data film anchored around a surreal landcape where each second equalled one day, weaving public health data, government decisions, and daily life into a single evolving ecosystem.

London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset

Solution

We started by asking how to honor individual experience within collective trauma. From this empathy-first approach, we built a living ecosystem where mobility shimmers across viral membranes, cases rise as peaks, deaths drift as particles, and vaccines spin halos of hope. Sound deepened every layer — heartbeats marking time, basslines pulsing with movement, new tones swelling with vaccinations. The result transforms clinical data into visceral, shared reflection.

London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset

Impact

The project premiered at the Brighton Digital Festival and is now part of the Museum of London’s permanent collection — preserved for future generations to revisit and explore this unprecedented moment in history. It demonstrates how data humanism can turn numbers into memory, empathy, and shared reflection.

London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset
London Under the Microscope Asset

Does your data call for clarity, emotion and imagination?

CREDITS

Concept, Direction, Production: Valentina D’Efilippo Developer: Arpad Ray Sonification: Duncan Geere