Belonging is often talked about as something that happens between people. But it also happens between people and places.

The street where you know which house has the friendly dog. The café where the barista knows your order. The park where you recognise the same faces each Saturday morning. The local pub, library, sporting club or market where you do not necessarily know everyone, but you know how you fit.

These relationships with place can seem incidental, yet they form an important part of our social infrastructure. In 2024, 81% of Australians said they felt a sense of belonging in their local neighbourhood, while 82% believed people in their local area were willing to help their neighbours.

And there is evidence that this local connection matters beyond simply feeling good about where we live. The 2025 Mapping Social Cohesion study found people living in highly cohesive neighbourhoods were substantially more likely to develop or maintain happiness, trust and a strong sense of belonging in Australia over time.

Yet there is a contradiction. While most Australians still say they belong locally, 49% sometimes or often feel isolated from others and 41% sometimes or often feel left out.

We can therefore live somewhere without necessarily feeling part of it.

So, what makes somewhere feel like our place?

Patterns: Belonging is built through repeated contact

One of the clearest patterns is that belonging to place rarely comes from a single dramatic experience. It accumulates.

We walk the same streets. Buy coffee from the same café. Take children to the same playground. Walk the dog through the same park. Nod to the same neighbours. Visit the same shops.

These repeated, low-intensity encounters create familiarity. Familiarity can gradually become recognition, and recognition can become connection.

This helps explain why neighbourhood belonging remains surprisingly resilient. In 2025, 54% of Australians participated in some form of social, religious, civic or political group, while Scanlon’s research found that people who participate locally and perceive their neighbourhoods as cohesive are more likely to feel that they belong, trust others and be happy.

But belonging is not created by home alone.

Sociologist Ray Oldenburg popularised the idea of the “third place”: places outside the first place of home and second place of work where people can spend time around others. Cafés, pubs, libraries, parks, community centres, sporting clubs and local shops can all perform this role.

Their importance often comes from their ordinariness. You do not need an invitation. You can return regularly. Other people are doing the same.

Australian library use provides a useful example. Although only 20% of adults visited a library or archive in 2021–22, one-quarter of those who did visited 11 times or more during the year. Libraries are therefore not simply cultural destinations for many users; they are recurring places in everyday life.

The pattern is simple: belonging is often built through repetition.

The places we return to become familiar; familiar places accumulate memories, relationships and rituals; and eventually a location becomes part of how we understand home.

Tensions: We belong locally, yet increasingly live disconnected lives

The tension is that many of the conditions that help belonging develop are under pressure.

Australia still records strong neighbourhood belonging, but broader measures tell a more complicated story. The national sense-of-belonging index fell from 88 in 2020 to 77 in 2024, while the overall social cohesion index fell from 89 to 78.

Meanwhile, only 53% of Australians had face-to-face contact with family or friends outside their household at least weekly in 2025, compared with 68% in 2019. Formal volunteering also fell from 30% to 23% over the same period.

This creates several tensions.

Home can provide security, but also isolation. Remote work, streaming, delivery services and online shopping make it possible to fulfil more of our needs without leaving home. Convenience has increased, but some of the incidental interactions that once accompanied everyday life can disappear.

Mobility creates opportunity, but interrupts continuity. Moving for housing, education or employment means repeatedly rebuilding the local knowledge and weak social ties that turn somewhere unfamiliar into home.

Density can put people closer together without necessarily making them closer. An apartment building can contain hundreds of people who rarely speak, while a well-designed street of the same density can create repeated encounters between neighbours.

And third places need to be accessible to work as third places. A café may be welcoming, but participation usually requires spending money. Clubs may require membership. Commercial spaces can exclude people indirectly through price.

Safety matters too. In 2024, 54% of women said they felt unsafe walking alone at night in their local area, compared with 25% of men. People who felt unsafe also reported weaker neighbourhood belonging and greater social isolation.

Belonging to place, therefore, is not distributed equally.

The central tension is that proximity is not the same as connection.

We can build more homes, denser cities and faster digital networks without necessarily building more belonging.

Shifts: From somewhere we live to somewhere we participate

The emerging shift is towards recognising that belonging needs to be designed for, not simply hoped for.

Governments are increasingly treating social connection as part of urban infrastructure.

Victoria’s 20-minute neighbourhood model, for example, explicitly incorporates community hubs, parks, arts and culture, recreation, shops, hospitality and “places to play, meet and gather” within walking distance of home. The underlying idea is not simply convenience: walkable streets and community spaces create more opportunities for social interaction and cohesion.

Infrastructure Australia similarly defines social infrastructure as the facilities, spaces, services and networks that support community quality of life, recognising its contribution to social identity, inclusion and cohesion.

This represents an important shift in how we think about place.

Square Holes is a cultural insight studio.

We design mixed method explorations of people and culture beyond the category,  uncovering the patterns, tensions and shifts shaping behaviour to inform strategy, inspire innovation and enable confident decisions. Our studio model brings together the right mix of thinkers, researchers and specialists for each exploration. If you’re navigating change, entering a new market, or seeking deeper understanding of people and culture, let’s start a conversation >