Floating Space Podcast: The Third Place Where We Belong

There are innumerable reasons why people start podcasts. They range from “It’ll be fun,” “I can get rich doing this,” and “Maybe I can make the world just a little better.”

In her own words, freelance audio producer, podcaster, podcast host, writer, and educator Katie Stokes explains the origin of her new podcast, Floating Space.

Katie shares: “The theme really came from my own loneliness, moving to London as a remote worker and feeling quite overwhelmed by building community as a working adult.”

Katie’s work explores mental health, social relationships, and identity, and her exploration has taken the form of Floating Space, powered by Transmission Roundhouse.

Transmission Roundhouse is a home for innovative and groundbreaking audio-led content that champions the voices of underrepresented young creatives. The platform is made up of emerging presenters and producers aged 18–25, creating content from the heart of the Roundhouse to reach a wider range of audiences.

Although I would like to see Transmission Roundhouse embrace existing indie podcasts, it’s commendable that the company produces shows like Floating Space that admonish the treacly and crassly commercial, and instead delves into the interstices of our lives with a creative energy hard to match.

You must understand a bit of Katie’s life journey to comprehend Floating Space.

“I’m from Hong Kong — born and raised there until I moved to the U.K. in 2017 to study Psychology. I was working as an editor for an education publisher through Covid when I really fell in love with podcasts and audio art.”

Like many indie podcasters, Katie began with an audio project she was passionate about.

Katie explains: “I decided I wanted to give it a go and developed my first podcast Re:Mind The Podcast, looking at how small things impact our mental health in a big way, as a passion project. From there, I took short courses on podcasting at UCL and Roundhouse, spent a lot of time self-teaching audio production, and developed Floating Space with Transmission Roundhouse.”

Floating Space debuted on May 1. She begins the podcast by asking, “Do you know what a third place is?” Katie then posits that we are meant to have three places in our lives.

“Home, work, and a third place where you belong,” Katie explains in the podcast. “That third place is where you exist.”

In the show, Katie asks, “What happens when the place you live becomes the place where you work?”

Her answer is one that should concern us. “It’s when your life becomes a lot smaller.”

In episode one, Katie introduced herself to listeners. “Hi, I’m Katie. I’m 25. I live in London, and I’m lonely.”

Katie continues: “As I say in episode one, my social media algorithm laid the concept of third places at my feet, and the podcast helped facilitate my mission to make friends and find my own third place. Studying psychology and being mixed race growing up in Hong Kong has really informed a lot of my work in exploring identity and belonging, so that was definitely a driving factor for this show, at least on a subconscious level.”

In the two episodes released so far, listeners join host Katie Stokes as she searches for the third place we belong. The whole sonic experience feels somewhat ethereal, with Stokes amplifying that sensory notion with her deliberate, somewhat breathless delivery.

Stokes is an ideal sonic tour guide to that elusive third place, and I urge you to follow her on her quest by listening to Floating Space.