Reader, I think I may be suffering from opinion fatigue. The blinking text cursor, inexhaustibly patient, awaits an opinion — mine. If this were a stare-down between me and the text cursor, the text cursor would smoke me. Writing can be like that. Anything creative can be like that: a dance where you watch yourself, cringing, and kind of into it at the same time. What is it all for, one asks oneself? Why, God, me? This could be a bit performative. When I think about having opinion fatigue, I wonder whether it is about feeling tired of having an opinion or about the fact that having opinions is tiring. At the risk of sounding as though I am a 15-year-old influencer, caring about things is exhausting, you know?

I think it is the second. And, besides, you don’t really run out of what matters to you, so you always have an opinion. Rather, I suspect, (if it is not already obvious the ‘you’ here is ‘me’), you sort of run out of energy to prioritise it. This is similar to those times when one watches television, or scrolls a phone, or attempts to clear emails, after a back-to-back workday, exhausted and sub-human, lizard-like, sitting in front of a screen, rather than going to bed at a wise time in preparation for the next day’s challenges and joys.

Part of the lethargy may also be the result of the type of relationship inherent between a writer and a reader. Or writing and reading. It’s often seeming more akin to magic, than to the technology of written language. Black marks in space transmit emotions, knowledge, narratives, recipes! To me, the sheer abstraction of this — being human and participating in such an intangible exchange of information — makes it even more fascinating (and wild).

When I think about my favourite type of writing, it is less about a subject-object relationship; rather, it is a type of dynamic where the writing lets out pressure and lets in, I guess, a space. It is that which lets the reader daydream between the words. You are reading; you put down the page to create the space for what you have read to take up space in the world and, suddenly, you are reconnected to the world with new ideas.

I love that about writing and I have always loved that about architecture, and about buildings, urban spaces and human interventions into place. And, before this seems as though I am talking about some sort of Proustian category of literature, I would like to say that this sort of writing can exist on a New World recipe card, like an instruction to: “Find your wonderful”. Or indeed, more frequently, in the likes of a Hilary Mantel essay: “I have been trying to think back to what it was like when I was seen and not heard: when I was too young to talk; when nothing was transmitted but everything received; when I had the luxury of listening without a reply needed; when I could judge without responsibility; when I simply existed. With no further action required.”

Mantel captures the essence of that sort of space in her essay ‘Blot, erase, delete’, when she reflects on the luxury of listening without a reply needed. While Mantel is speaking specifically about the lowered expectations general society places on children to weigh in on discussions, there is a connection, and inspiration here for me. As adults, our perspectives and opinions have expectations and the pressure can be a lot. As children, we are not only allowed to be silent but we are also allowed to be full of error and human, in ways that are not allowed as we grow older.

The space Mantel describes, where children are free from the pressure to respond, mirrors the kind of architectural experiences I would say I appreciate the most — places that free us from the demands of life and allow us to exist without expectation. It is the space that frees us from the pressure of having to respond. It is this space — free from expectation to have a fully formed, impenetrable and beyond-critique view — that allows us to be new, and to be baptised in intrigue and play. As I reflect on these ideas during my daily commute into the city, I can’t help but notice the spaces around me, both filled and unfilled.

As we discuss the future of our cities, we must hold onto this sense of the poetic in space, while balancing it with the realities of the physical world. What seeded this column was my regular bus ride into the city, the happenstance beginning of ‘Blot, erase, delete’, and a meeting with the researchers, Kathryn Ovenden and Melanie McKelvie, behind the study: Life in Medium Density Housing in Tāmaki Makaurau/Auckland.

Catching a double-decker bus to the city, I often take a seat on the top level and, if it is the morning, I use the commute time to daydream and ease the process of still-sleepy to functioning being, and, if it is the afternoon, the commute time is one of decompression. Regardless of what state I am in, I almost always take in the urban quality of the city and reflect on what will fill in the spaces left over from what exists. When I place that thought in dialogue with Mantel’s words, I consider how one’s personal thoughts and the pressure to express them take on new dimensions as one ages. The report highlights that, when we think about medium-density housing, what people often crave are surprisingly simple things — more storage, larger living spaces. These are the everyday needs that shape the ways we interact with the spaces around us, yet they’re often overlooked in discussions about junctures between architecture and urban design.

As I reflect on the interplay between writing and architecture, I realise that both crafts offer something rare: space. Just as a well-designed building can allow us to pause and reconnect with ourselves, a genuine and thoughtfully written sentence invites us to dream between the words. In a time where opinion fatigue and the pressures of constant productivity can feel overwhelming, both writing and architecture create moments of respite — spaces where we can simply exist, with no further action required.

Perhaps that’s what we need most — whether it is a lounge dancing with light, or a well-designed space that holds all we carry through this mortal coil, or a sentence that captures the thoughts we hold close. It’s a space, a moment, a chance to close the eyes, breathe and make room for new ideas — even something like an opinion.