Friendship Fair · Helsinki · 26 Nov 2026
Can we make finding our people less random?
Friendship Fair is a live experiment in creating better conditions for adults to meet people they genuinely want to know again.
100 new connections. One night.
An ambitious goal for an experiment — not a promise. We'd rather aim high in public and tell you honestly what happened.
17:30 — 21:30
Helsinki
Venue being chosen now
TODAY @ ODDSPACE
Want to join the Friendship Fair? Start with the Connection Profile.
You're helping us test the questions that shape how people meet at the Fair. It takes a few minutes on your phone.
What is this?
A live social experiment
Not a mixer, not networking, not speed-dating. A designed evening we're studying as it happens.
Made for adults
For people whose lives are full but whose social lives have quietly narrowed. No student-orientation energy.
Interaction is designed
Nobody is left holding a drink hoping someone approaches. The structure does the hard part.
Continuity beyond the room
The point isn't a nice evening. The point is what still exists a month later.
Three questions we're actually asking
01
Person × Person
What actually makes two adults want to see each other again — beyond shared demographics or shared interests on paper?
02
Person × Context
How much of connection is the room? Timing, food, noise, structure, permission — what conditions make people show up as themselves?
03
Continuity
What turns a good evening into an actual friendship? Where does momentum survive the walk home?
How the evening works
Ten movements across four hours, built so social energy rises, rests, and rises again — roughly 17:30 to 21:30.
- 17:30LANDArrive without performing. Somewhere to put your coat and your nerves.
- 18:00WELCOMEThe room is framed. What tonight is, what it isn't.
- 18:15EXPANDShort, wide, low-stakes contact with many people.
- 18:35GATHER + EATFood as the social solvent. Tables do the work.
- 19:15DEPTH 1First real conversation, in a chosen mode.
- 20:00RESETQuiet, air, water. Social stamina protected.
- 20:25DEPTH 2Second choice — different mode, different people.
- 21:10CHOOSE AGAINDecide what to keep going -- and communities that support that
- 21:20CLOSEA clear ending, and how to keep this going.
- 21:30LINGERNo one is swept out. Endings need room.
Connection has more than one mode
Some people connect by talking. Others by making, moving, solving, or simply sitting nearby. The evening is built around all of it.
TALK — Conversation as the main event
PLAY — Games, jokes, low stakes
MAKE — Hands busy, talk easier
MOVE — Walking, stretching, dancing
SOLVE — Big questions, systems thinking together
SHARE — Swap items or ideas of your own
CONTRIBUTE — Volunteering & being helpful
EXPLORE — Curiosity, new things, new ideas
LISTEN — Attention as the gift
EAT — Shared food, shared table
CHILL — Company without effort
The Connection Profile
Before the Fair, you answer a set of questions about how you actually connect — your social weather, what you'd welcome, what you bring. It's how we shape the room around real people instead of guesses.
How the handoff works
1. You answer the questions on connection.workupward.com — a separate UPWARD site.
2. You see your Connection Snapshot there, straight away.
3. Copy your unique Connection Snapshot link, and share that in the appropriate field when you request a space at the Friendship Fair.
NOT A TYPE. NOT A SCORE. JUST YOUR APPROACH TO CONNECTION, SHAPED INTO SOMETHING PEOPLE CAN CONNECT WITH.
Make your Connection ProfileGet involved
Come as a participant
Join the room on 26 November. Interest first, invitations later.
Help make it happen
Facilitate, volunteer, bring your community, contribute expertise, document it.
Partner with us
Feed the room, make an experience possible, keep participation accessible.