Over two decades since the Good Friday Agreement was signed, social spaces remain heavily contested in Northern Ireland. On the one hand, top-down approaches toward ushering in a new spatiality for a shared future have had limited success. On the other hand, there is increasing evidence that a ‘shared future’ disconnected from local historical and cultural contexts is unsustainable. By studying the debates surrounding three contemporary ‘shared spaces’ in East Belfast—the Titanic Quarter, the proposed Naíscoil na Seolta and East Belfast GAA Club—this paper studies why some spaces are more acceptable to the general public compared to others. At a time when recent elections suggest that the region is at the cusp of political change, this paper argues that a new spatiality with grassroots community initiatives at its core must be simultaneously imagined in Belfast.