One Design Firm’s Quarantine, in Data

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How exactly—and we mean exactly—have you slept during quarantine?

How are the skies above you different?

How has your cell phone usage evolved?

The Spanish design studio Errea Communicación, based in Pamplona, knows.

For the past 50 days of quarantine, Errea has been collecting data and publishing a visualization in the newspaper Diario de Navarra. The nine staffers at the firm effectively act as representatives of their fellow citizens in lockdown and bring vibrant life to a medley of relatable datasets. Sometimes cheeky, sometimes somber, the figures offer a mirror of our collective experience.

“Infographics, one of our specialties, is a hybrid genre that encompasses and is adaptable to almost any subject,” the firm writes. “Above all, we view it as a tool at the service of people, in a way similar to the concept of ‘data humanism,’ so ably developed by noted designer Giorgia Lupi. We are convinced that overwhelming displays of data are quite often useless if they are not linked to emotions. Data can and should tell stories that connect with people, and if it does not, then it is nothing more than pure, cold statistics.”

All told, Errea’s Quarantine Visual Album is a time capsule of the micro and macro.

Don’t speak Spanish? Don’t worry. As the studio’s work proves, data truly transcends language.


“Bumper Cars”—one family’s overlapping movements within a 968-square-foot apartment. (Two adults, three children.)


The spread of the virus (in red) on the front page of the Diario de Navarra across three months—January, February and March.


Every bird that passed by one window during a 12-hour timespan—1,368 appearances by 16 different species (the heavy yellow concentration is blackbirds).


The Errea Communicación team’s mobile usage during the first 19 days of quarantine—19,570 minutes total, broken down by app.


The air traffic above Pamplona on a single day in April 2020, and one year earlier—42 planes vs. 648.


Sleep patterns during quarantine and before—roughly the same amount, though the quality has diminished.


A catalog of virtual travel via video calls.


What beverages each Errea Communicación staffer has consumed in volume, and by category—soda (purple), coffee (brown), milk (cream), water (blue), juice (peach), blends (green), wine (maroon), beer (gold), liquor (black).

Images: Errea