For the past year a group of designers have been meeting regularly for a series of conversations in an attempt to develop dialogue as a process and platform for learning and producing work. At some point during the many weeks and months they founded (or is it found? ) POI - The Peckham Outer-Space Initiative with the intention of exploiting the vehicle(s) of space to contextualise and focus the dialogue. A record of POI's current ideas, thoughts and activities have been compiled in the book Ships not shelters. SnS is an introduction to POI's exploits as well as serving as an internal and external brief for future dialogue, design and thinking.