Andrea Lau
Thesis Project:Mapping Motherhood: The Mama Archives
Mapping Motherhood: The Mama Archive
MakanBersama Design Lab
Andrea is a multidisciplinary designer with a background in spatial design. She graduated from Temasek Polytechnic with a Diploma in Interior Architecture and Design, before beginning her career in the commercial interior design industry, where she worked on workplace and office environments. Through this experience, she developed a strong understanding of how people interact with space, while building skills in concept development, spatial planning, and client-centred design solutions.
Her time in the commercial sector also led her to question how design could be more purposeful, and what meaningful impact it could have on people’s everyday lives. This motivated her to further her studies in UAS–LASALLE’s Design for Social Futures programme, where she explored research-led, socially engaged, and human-centred approaches to design. Today, her practice focuses on understanding behaviours, uncovering gaps within systems and services, and developing thoughtful interventions that respond to real needs.
When she is not designing, Andrea is often at the gym or playing video games.
How do everyday responsibilities shape a mother’s opportunities for connection? Socialising is not something mothers choose to give up; both constraint and care often shape it in their everyday circumstances.Understanding a mother’s typical dayPrompt used to map out a mother’s daily routineAn analysis of the routines of mothers, discovering what limits or motivates a mother to socialise.Presenting the analysis together with the mother whose participation made this project possible.Understanding the factors a mother takes into account when preparing meals for her children.Chopping curry leaves as part of meal prepKiribath, prepared as part of everyday care, adjusted to her children’s preferences
Mapping Motherhood:
The Mama Archive
MakanBersama Design Lab
This thesis project explores mothers as often-overlooked community assets by examining how care, social connection, and everyday knowledge are embedded within daily routines. Mothers are frequently understood through domestic and caregiving roles, yet these responsibilities also sustain informal networks of support, cultural exchange, and community resilience. Through field engagements with mothers from different backgrounds, this project investigates how time, labour, and responsibility shape their opportunities for social participation, while recognising the strengths already present within their everyday lives as valuable resources for community development.
A key area of focus emerged through observing the relationship between motherhood and social life. Mothers are often perceived as socially isolated, but this thesis argues that socialising is not absent by choice. Rather, it is often constrained by circumstance. During engagements, mothers were frequently interrupted, with their attention divided between conversation and caregiving. In one instance, a mother was feeding her child while simultaneously teaching her how to play a game, making it difficult for her to fully engage. These moments revealed that social participation is often shaped by competing responsibilities rather than a lack of desire for connection.
How do everyday responsibilities shape a mother’s opportunities for connection? Socialising is not something mothers choose to give up; both constraint and care often shape it in their everyday circumstances.Understanding a mother’s typical dayPrompt used to map out a mother’s daily routineAn analysis of the routines of mothers, discovering what limits or motivates a mother to socialise.Presenting the analysis together with the mother whose participation made this project possible.Understanding the factors a mother takes into account when preparing meals for her children.Chopping curry leaves as part of meal prepKiribath, prepared as part of everyday care, adjusted to her children’s preferencesHow do everyday responsibilities shape a mother’s opportunities for connection? Socialising is not something mothers choose to give up; both constraint and care often shape it in their everyday circumstances.Understanding a mother’s typical dayPrompt used to map out a mother’s daily routineAn analysis of the routines of mothers, discovering what limits or motivates a mother to socialise.Presenting the analysis together with the mother whose participation made this project possible.Understanding the factors a mother takes into account when preparing meals for her children.Chopping curry leaves as part of meal prepKiribath, prepared as part of everyday care, adjusted to her children’s preferencesR
Research Methodologies
To explore this further, the project developed a series of visual maps documenting mothers’ daily schedules. Using layered transparent sheets, the maps reveal how caregiving, household labour, paid work, and personal time frequently overlap rather than exist as separate activities. Across participants, a recurring pattern emerged: socialising often takes place only when it intersects with another routine, such as grocery shopping, bringing children to the playground, or during short break times. This reframes mothers’ social lives as adaptive and embedded within care, while highlighting opportunities for more inclusive forms of community engagement.
Alongside the maps, The Mama Archive was developed as a collection of recipes, stories, and reflections contributed by mothers. The recipes specifically document dishes that their children enjoy most, including how mothers adapt them based on their children’s preferences in taste and texture, as well as how they make them more nutritious. The stories capture everyday experiences that may be relatable to other mothers, drawing out shared challenges, routines, and moments of care. Together, these cards form a collective narrative that highlights commonalities between mothers who receive the archive, allowing them to recognise shared experiences across different households.
Designed to be returned to the mothers themselves, the archive aims to cultivate pride by recognising that their everyday knowledge, experiences, and practices are valuable forms of expertise. By seeing contributions from other mothers in the neighbourhood, participants may also begin to recognise one another, creating opportunities for familiarity, conversation, mutual support, and stronger social connections.
Together, these outcomes challenge narrow perceptions of motherhood as private or isolated labour. Instead, the thesis positions mothers as active contributors whose routines, skills, and informal networks already hold strong potential for social participation and community development. By making these invisible forms of labour visible, the project proposes more inclusive ways of valuing care as an essential form of social infrastructure.
How do everyday responsibilities shape a mother’s opportunities for connection? Socialising is not something mothers choose to give up; both constraint and care often shape it in their everyday circumstances.Understanding a mother’s typical dayPrompt used to map out a mother’s daily routineAn analysis of the routines of mothers, discovering what limits or motivates a mother to socialise.Presenting the analysis together with the mother whose participation made this project possible.Understanding the factors a mother takes into account when preparing meals for her children.Chopping curry leaves as part of meal prepKiribath, prepared as part of everyday care, adjusted to her children’s preferencesHow do everyday responsibilities shape a mother’s opportunities for connection? Socialising is not something mothers choose to give up; both constraint and care often shape it in their everyday circumstances.Understanding a mother’s typical dayPrompt used to map out a mother’s daily routineAn analysis of the routines of mothers, discovering what limits or motivates a mother to socialise.Presenting the analysis together with the mother whose participation made this project possible.Understanding the factors a mother takes into account when preparing meals for her children.Chopping curry leaves as part of meal prepKiribath, prepared as part of everyday care, adjusted to her children’s preferencesHow do everyday responsibilities shape a mother’s opportunities for connection? Socialising is not something mothers choose to give up; both constraint and care often shape it in their everyday circumstances.Understanding a mother’s typical dayPrompt used to map out a mother’s daily routineAn analysis of the routines of mothers, discovering what limits or motivates a mother to socialise.Presenting the analysis together with the mother whose participation made this project possible.Understanding the factors a mother takes into account when preparing meals for her children.Chopping curry leaves as part of meal prepKiribath, prepared as part of everyday care, adjusted to her children’s preferences