“Do I like you yet?”
The answer has to arrive quickly, so polish, speed and confidence appear first.
Rotation · introduction · assessmentProject
Why the room matters
The room decides
what gets revealed.
Put six people in a rotation and you learn who is quickest at being likeable. Give the same six people something at stake and a different set of qualities appears.
Our working premiseChange the conditions, not the people.
A position, task or shared problem gives attention, judgement and generosity somewhere to become visible.
The starting point
A format is not neutral. It rewards a version of you.
Most singles events already have a format: speed dating, a mixer, a set of prompts, a shared activity. The problem is not that nothing happens. It is that the structure often keeps people in the safest, most generic version of themselves.
The Dalloway question
The evening gives people a reason to take a position, make a choice, tell a story, make a plan, or get involved.
The point is not a personality test or an icebreaker. Just enough friction for something real to appear. We do not know whether it will work. That is what the project is for.
Test the room
The same room can ask a different question.
Most singles events ask people to perform being likeable. Change what the room is built around, and you change what people get to reveal. Then choose someone in the room.
D
Built around · Action
Give the room a task, a motion, or a shared problem. People stop polishing the introduction and start showing how they think.
Person A reveals
How they enter a shared problem: whether they lead, listen, question the premise, or make room for someone quieter.
The change
Change the question. Change what appears.
“What do you do when something happens?”
Attention shifts from presentation to judgement, curiosity and how someone treats the room.
Debate · decision · shared problemAbout the name
A literary reference,
not a literary project.
The name comes from Clarissa Dalloway, the central character in Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway. She spends a day preparing a party because she believes that bringing people together can have meaning.
That is the bit we kept. Not the costumes, the quotations, or the idea that you need to have read the book. The Dalloway Project is about the belief underneath it: bringing people together is worth taking seriously.
You do not need to know Virginia Woolf to come to an event. You only need to be interested in meeting someone in a way that is less predictable.
What we believe
A few rules
worth keeping.
Format changes things.
The structure should give people something to do, not just someone to assess. It should alter the conversation, not simply organise it.
Honesty matters more.
This is for single people who want to meet someone. We won't disguise the intent as networking, friendship, or a lifestyle brand.
Leaving matters too.
The project is designed to send people somewhere else. No endless regulars. No keeping you in the funnel forever.
The honest bit
We don't know if
we'll pull it off.
It is an attempt, not a promise. The point of calling it a project is that the answer is not settled yet. We are going to try stranger formats, more deliberate structures, and fewer shortcuts, and pay attention to what happens.
Read the pledges