Wayfinding as Storytelling

Malls & Stores of the Future > Interviews > Wayfinding as Storytelling

Tim Dow, Strategic Director at Tim Rob Don Dow, works at the intersection of human behaviour, spatial design, and wayfinding, helping centres and precincts make places that simply make sense to the people moving through them. His work focuses less on adding information, and more on removing friction. How environments communicate through layout, landmarks, and expectation, long before a sign is read or a screen is touched. In this interview, Tim unpacks why great wayfinding starts with behaviour, not technology, and why the most effective solutions are often the quietest ones.

Who should lead the “find your way” story—the centre or each store—and how do you make them work together?
Neither should dominate. The real answer is that the customer, their needs, requirements, expectations, and behaviours, should lead the development of the “find your way” story. This isn’t a simple, one-size-fits-all question. It depends entirely on the vision, ambition, and competency of the centre and each store, and how relevant they are to each other.

A useful framework: the centre typically focuses on the “Brilliant Basics”—the foundational infrastructure of wayfinding that creates trust and removes friction. Clear sightlines, logical addressing, consistent hierarchy, and orientation. Stores can then focus on their “Moments that Matter”—the emotional, memorable, brand-defining touchpoints that make their experience distinctive. When the basics work invisibly, stores have permission to be distinctive.
 
This only works when both the centre and individual stores understand the same human behaviours. What modes and mindsets do people arrive in? What’s their familiarity with the environment? What’s their time pressure? The centre gets you to the door; the store decides what happens next. Both need to understand the same human behaviours.
 
 
What clues tell you people are getting lost (crowding, repeat questions, backtracking), and how do you fix them fast?
The best clues come from the people on the ground, your front desk, concierge, security, and cleaning crews. Staff who work at the coalface every day are sitting on a goldmine of diagnostic data. If they’re repeatedly answering the same question in the same location, that’s systematic failure, not anecdote. Watch for the physical symptoms of people pausing at decision points, backtracking, crowding around directories, checking their phones, but more importantly, listen to your operational teams.

Most wayfinding challenges are caused by misalignment with expectations and those misalignments are often rooted in spatial or operational conditions, not information gaps. A front door that looks like a front door is a much better solution than a giant neon sign saying “here is the front door.” Use an awning, flags, lighting, aligned paths of travel, landscaping to orient customers naturally.

I always use signage as a last resort. Signage is the least effective tool for changing behaviour. Spatial design, operational positioning, and architectural legibility do the heavy lifting.
 
 
When are digital screens worth it, and when are simple signs better?
Digital screens excel at a few things and fail at many others. There are plenty of assumptions and truisms about digital wayfinding that simply aren’t accurate. The mistake is assuming digital is automatically better because it’s newer. Technology should serve behaviour, not replace it.

Digital makes sense when digital makes sense—when it’s expected and genuinely useful in context. We naturally look for passenger information displays on train platforms, scoreboards at sporting stadiums, or the next number display at the deli counter.
 
Expectations are shifting; touchscreen searchable directories at shopping centres are now standard. But there’s a reason our fire egress signage remains static. There’s a trust and authority associated with permanent signage that digital can’t replicate. Digital or dynamic information can change easily—so do we trust it less?

Digital should be used sparingly, in locations and roles that align with expectations. Static signs work for stable information—restrooms, exits, building names—and at decision points where people need instant, reliable recognition. The best approach isn’t digital versus static; it’s understanding where each format serves human behaviour most effectively.
 
 
One change that made the centre easier for everyone—kids, seniors, and people with different needs—what was it?
Universal design principles benefit everyone, not just people with alternative needs. The change that works for a parent with a pram, a senior with limited mobility, and a child is usually the same: lowering complexity and cognitive load.

The most effective approach is avoiding the casino effect, or making everything appear the same to confuse or trap people. Trapping people doesn’t work. If people understand where they are and where they need to be in a certain time, they’re more likely to dwell and explore. You achieve this by making the place legible, memorable, and describable in simple terms.

Play to your strengths and use authentic landmarks. This can include linear landmarks that people can navigate along. Do you have a “garden walk” or “arcade” as these can create named intersections where people can build their own spatial relationship: “meet me at the corner of X and Y.” Accessibility isn’t a separate layer. But a foundation that allows everyone to orient themselves, create mental maps, and feel confident moving through space.
 
 
What’s the most common mistake you see in mall signs, and how would you fix it this week?
The most common mistake is over-signing. Adding more signs instead of fixing an underlying problem. When wayfinding fails, the instinct is to add another directional sign, another map, another “You Are Here.” But often, the issue isn’t a lack of information, but poor spatial legibility, inconsistent logic, or misalignment with expectation.
Work with your strengths. Have a broader vision. Aim for a legible place that is memorable and describable. If people can easily explain where they are and how to get somewhere, you’ve succeeded. If they can’t, no amount of signage will compensate for a place that doesn’t make sense on its own terms.
 
If I could only do one thing: remove half the signs in a place and see what happens. The critical signs reveal themselves immediately through customer behaviour and staff feedback. The rest was noise. It’s a similar approach to the desire lines method for path layout in public greens, where you just plant grass and wait to see where people actually walk before building paths.
 
 

Tim will be sharing more insights at the 2026 Malls & Stores of the Future Summit. View the brochure for details on his session and the full two-day agenda.