The pandemic may be encouraging people to live in larger groups

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IN MARCH, WHEN Britain went into lockdown for the first time, Andrew Davidson, a 69-year-old retiree who lives alone, was in the middle of renovating his house in the small town of Leamington Spa. The kitchen was a building site so he accepted an offer from his sister to move in with her and her husband in Birmingham for a couple of weeks. Before leaving he asked the builder to put in temporary kitchen surfaces so he could move back in if they couldn’t stand living together. Mr Davidson ended up staying away for nine weeks. It was “absolutely brilliant”, he says.

In the mornings he would go for a walk with his sister or brother-in-law, or they would do gardening. In the afternoons they retreated to their own spaces to work on their own hobbies: German lessons via Zoom, Spanish study, and textile printing. They ate dinner together, sharing cooking and all-important baking duties. “Living together was a bit of a revelation,” says Mr Davidson. “I was quite sorry to move out.” He says after his...