The Thread is a temporary public activation to hold space for grief and connectivity.

Photo by Daniel Jackson for Embassy: Interactive

Photo by Daniel Jackson for Embassy: Interactive

Visitors to the installation in Philadelphia are invited to use the disconnected rotary phone to “call” their lost loved ones. This intimate shelter offers a way to keep the thread of connection and conversation with those that are unreachable.

It is a space for reflection and remembrance, for listening and laughter, for stories and silence, for tears and tenderness, for comfort and catharsis.

Our community is grieving.

Whether because of deaths due to the COVID-19 pandemic, gun violence, or the opioid crisis, or absences due to incarceration, illness, or disability, our collective grief needs a place to be witnessed.

We offer The Thread, and the tangible use of the phone, to provide a container for connection to and expression of grief.

“Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.”
— W.S. Merwin

The Inspiration

Our project is inspired by the Wind Phone, created by Itaru Sasaki in Iwate Prefecture, Japan, in 2010. After his cousin’s death, Sasaki set up an old telephone booth in his garden to continue to feel connected to his cousin, "Because my thoughts couldn't be relayed over a regular phone line, I wanted them to be carried on the wind."

The 2011 Tōhoku tsunami resulted in the deaths of over 15,000 people in the Tōhoku region. Sasaki subsequently opened the wind phone to the public to allow visitors to call their friends and family who had died in the disaster. It has since been visited by over 30,000 people.