The new materials in public art installations give the birth to interactivity and participation, which in turn, introduces new challenges, not only in the creative design process, but also in how to involve the participants in this process and in evaluating the targeted experience such as such as social connectedness and inclusion. Six design cases are presented, as examples for interactive and participatory forms of these installations. The design techniques and the user experience evaluation methods overlap in these cases and many of these techniques and methods have been found to be useful in our practice.

The merge of the Web of People and the Internet of Things leads to a shift from technology-push product or system oriented design to data-driven service centric design. The growth and development of social computing have dramatically increased the complexity but also offer new opportunities and solutions in the societal context. We look into the challenges in designing for social interaction in public spaces, in particular in cities and professional environments. With several examples in designing interactive public installations, we present the design techniques and practices used in these examples, as well as the evaluation methods that have been found to be useful in evaluating the user experience such as social connectedness and inclusion.