The Virtual Guide Dog Walkshop: Rediscovering connection, imagination and sustainability through walking

This article focuses on a hybrid experimental practice called the Walkshop, developed during the COVID-19 lockdown and presented in two iterations, both in 2020, at the Walking Congress in Guimarães and the Tbilisi Architecture Biennial . In this experiment, geographically distant participants were virtually paired to guide one another synchronously through unfamiliar landscapes using geolocation tools and dialogic exchange. The Walkshop foregrounds a double dynamic: the reactivation of sensory presence through physical movement and the humanization of technology through shared embodied experiences. Drawing on philosophical, anthropological and phenomenological frameworks – Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty and Le Breton – the Walkshop positions walking not merely as locomotion but also as spacing – an embodied process of producing space through sensory engagement and movement. This walking experiment demonstrates how digital tools – seen as disembodying – can instead foster proximity, poetic dialogue and collective creativity. Participant feedback reveals heightened environmental awareness, personal transformation and profound human connection. The Walkshop provided an opportunity to observe first hand the benefits of walking, while exploring the potential of technology to support a hybrid physical–virtual experiment.