“Even If I Do It, I Cannot See Any Differences”: Designing Strategies To Facilitate Adolescents’ Low-Carbon Behavior,
2026
Southern University of Science and Technology, China, People's Republic of
“Even If I Do It, I Cannot See Any Differences”: Designing Strategies To Facilitate Adolescents’ Low-Carbon Behavior, Rui Shan, Wenhao Zhou, Huanshu Jiang, Wanlin Zhang
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Climate change, an urgent threat to millions of lives, requires collective efforts to advance a low-carbon transition. In particular, as future citizens, adolescents play a key role in shaping a low-carbon future. To understand how their potential can be supported, this study examines how design, particularly through human-computer interaction as a technology-mediated approach, can encourage adolescents to adopt low-carbon behavior. To do so, a formative study was conducted. First, we conducted a survey to understand adolescents’ cognitive levels and behavioral characteristics. Findings from this stage reveal that adolescents’ low-carbon behavior can be cultivated before a conscious understanding is established. Building …
Beyond Ephemerality: Boundary Objects And The Plasticity Of Listening In Collaborative Design,
2026
Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music, France
Beyond Ephemerality: Boundary Objects And The Plasticity Of Listening In Collaborative Design, Stefano Delle Monache, Dave Murray-Rust, Elif Özcan, Nicolas Misdariis
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Sound-driven design requires shared objects to bridge disciplinary divides and support collaboration between diverse expertise. Boundary Objects and Intermediary Objects typically fulfil this need, yet the ephemerality of sound is in apparent conflict with the stability needed for this boundary work. However, we argue for extending the object beyond the ephemeral sound wave to encompass tools, user interfaces, methods, and lexicons that provide material persistence. To support this we develop an analytical framework combining BO and IO properties and apply it to a selection of sound design tools in the literature. We argue that the required interpretive flexibility and perceived …
Investigating Context In Sonic Interaction Design For Sleep: Bridging Users And Designers Through Participatory And Ideation Workshops,
2026
KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
Investigating Context In Sonic Interaction Design For Sleep: Bridging Users And Designers Through Participatory And Ideation Workshops, Abhishek Choubey, Tinke Van Buijtene, Sandra Pauletto
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Sleep is fundamental to health and well-being, yet sleep problems have risen sharply in recent years. These problems often arise from individual and contextual factors, some of which are modifiable through behaviour or design. Research examining sleep’s contextual factors and how they can inform design interventions remains limited. This article presents two connected workshops exploring these aspects of sleep using participatory and speculative design methods. The first workshop invited participants to map contextual aspects of sleep through empathy maps and speculative exercises revealing three themes affecting sleep: safety, sleep routines, and stress or anxiety. The second focused on ideation asking …
Public Sector’S Climate Commoning And Infrastructural Care,
2026
Malmö university, Sweden
Public Sector’S Climate Commoning And Infrastructural Care, Alicia Smedberg, Per Linde, Anders Melin, Joakim Nordqvist
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Local urban governments struggle to approach environmental goals in the global climate crisis. An understanding on the necessitiy to increase fair citizen engagement in governmental sustainability initiatives has become fundamental, the challenge emerge on how processes can become resilient beyond specific project initiatives. The concept of infrastructruring, here understood as a situated effort to hold together socio-material constellations that enable certain ways of acting, provides a foundation for long-term interaction between the public sector and citizens. But as the participatory design community is strong on providing ”points of entry” for citizen participation it remains less clear how one cares for …
More Than Concrete: The Tacit Knowledge Of Construction Workers Through Material Cognition And Embodied Experiences,
2026
Southern University of Science and Technology, China, People's Republic of
More Than Concrete: The Tacit Knowledge Of Construction Workers Through Material Cognition And Embodied Experiences, Enza Migliore, Mirna Zordan, Peiyue Lin
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Concrete builds the assets and aesthetics of contemporary cities. This research suggests that concrete also shapes emotions and cognition, generating a tacit body of valuable experience. Construction workers, who engage with this material daily, embody expertise through their bodily practices. Yet their insights remain unheard and underrepresented in the design discourse. This study adopts a material engagement approach, using concrete samples as probes and conducting semi-structured on-site interviews with 14 workers in Shenzhen, China. Analysing 280 minutes of video and audio data thematically, the research reveals that workers and materials mutually shape each other. Workers develop their understanding of concrete …
Three-Eyed Seeing: A Framework For Regenerative Ecological Design,
2026
LUT Business School, LUT University, Lappeenranta, Finland;
School of Design, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
Three-Eyed Seeing: A Framework For Regenerative Ecological Design, Korey Wetherell, Chris Speed, Laura Albareda
DRS Biennial Conference Series
The design field is increasingly engaging with the challenge of regenerating Earth systems within planetary boundaries, yet the epistemic foundations of regenerative ecological design remain diffuse. This paper introduces Three-Eyed Seeing as a design framework that brings Western empirical methods, Indigenous relational knowledge, and futural imaginaries into accountable dialogue. The framework supports plural ways of knowing without collapsing them into a single worldview and positions designers as mediators across multiple ontological commitments. Drawing on an autoethnographic field encounter with pollinators at Kaʻena Point in Hawaiʻi alongside ecological systems-oriented design research, the study explores how these distinct ways of knowing can …
Playing Future Places Together,
2026
RMIT University, Australia
Playing Future Places Together, Troy Innocent, Carolyn Briggs, Ashleigh Dharma, Carlo Tolentino
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Cities are physical manifestations of how we live together in urgent need of redesign to adapt and respond to impacts of climate change. Place-based methods offer critical and imaginative ways to work with neighbourhoods as living labs for regenerative futures and planetary civics. Reworlding explores urban play as method in co-governance of the green transition of neighbourhoods. It works with posthuman methods to give nature a voice, supporting more-than-human approaches, and addressing climate, biodiversity, and pollution challenges. Play and democracy balance interests, power, and knowledge asymmetries among neighbourhood actors by engaging cultural actors and use local, indigenous, or marginalised knowledge …
The Black Box In Spatial Planning: Visualizations Of Indeterminacy In Cybernetics And Model Theory,
2026
The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong S.A.R. (China)
The Black Box In Spatial Planning: Visualizations Of Indeterminacy In Cybernetics And Model Theory, Marlon J. Brownsword, Adam Jasper, Christiane M. Herr, Thomas Fischer
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper traces the historical and conceptual role of the black box as a diagrammatic figure in planning theory. Emerging from pre-war radio circuit jargon, and first theorized in cybernetics, the black box articulated a productive tension: it acknowledged the indeterminacy of future contingencies whilst concealing moments of executive discretion. Alongside cybernetics, the black box became an omnipresent yet elusive figure in 1960s and 70s spatial planning. Against the backdrop of contemporary debates on explainable AI (XAI), this history has acquired renewed significance for designers. Examining a corpus of planning diagrams produced over fifty years ago, the paper shows how …
Shifting From Creativity To Sympoiesis: A Site-Oriented Design Inquiry Of More-Than-Human Creative Ai,
2026
Division of Media Technology and Interaction Design, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden
Shifting From Creativity To Sympoiesis: A Site-Oriented Design Inquiry Of More-Than-Human Creative Ai, Petra Jääskeläinen, Lisa Boulton, Ron Wakkary, Gillian Russell
DRS Biennial Conference Series
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Cob Club: Co-Exploratory Earth Building Experiments, Foolish In Technique And Form,
2026
The University of the West of England, Bristol, United Kingdom
Cob Club: Co-Exploratory Earth Building Experiments, Foolish In Technique And Form, Tavs Jorgensen, James Burch, Nina Shoulder, Toni Amato
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper presents the design and building of an experimental pavilion using a novel technique of extruded cob manufacture. Design Research is presented as the co-exploration of a sequence of semi-controlled variables by a shifting body of researchers, facilitators, students, and makers where authorship becomes suffused amongst these collaborators. This co-created knowledge is rightly presented as a paper co-authored by the student interns and academics involved. Phases of architectural design, material investigation, manufacture, and construction are discussed as an episodic series of inter-connected prototyping dialogues between human, machine, and material actors; and as emergent making where embodied knowledge is inherent …
How Sound Knowledge And Education Can Support Designers In Creating Museum Experiences: Insights From Semi-Structured Interviews With Experts In Acoustics/Sound,
2026
Beijing institute of technology, China;
Politecnico di Milano, Italy
How Sound Knowledge And Education Can Support Designers In Creating Museum Experiences: Insights From Semi-Structured Interviews With Experts In Acoustics/Sound, Yi Zhang
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Today, the growing demand for sound in shaping multisensory museum experiences requires exhibition designers to acquire relevant sound knowledge. However, designers often find it difficult to identify applicable insights across the vast and interdisciplinary fields of acoustics and sound studies. Thus, this paper conducts twelve semi-structured interviews with experts in acoustics and sound-related disciplines. The findings establish a basic sound knowledge framework comprising four thematic areas with related concepts: fundamentals of acoustics, sound and space, sound and audience experience, and sound control and technology. In addition, the paper explores interdisciplinary communication and collaboration in sound design practices within exhibition productions. …
Decolonizing Care In Design Research: Familiness And Relational Practices From Creative Ageing In Thailand,
2026
Bangkok University, Thailand
Decolonizing Care In Design Research: Familiness And Relational Practices From Creative Ageing In Thailand, Khemmiga Teerapong, Boonanan Natakun
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper advances a decolonised understanding of care within design research by examining how relational and culturally grounded practices shape engagements with older adults in Thailand’s rapidly aging society. Drawing on the Monday Museum creative ageing initiative in Bangkok’s Khlong Bang Luang neighbourhood, the study critiques Western-centric framings of care that privilege clinical, individualised, or outcome-driven approaches. Fieldwork and co-design activities with elderly residents reveal that care emerges as a relational practice embedded in local cultural norms, expressed through attentiveness, reciprocity, and shared responsibility. The paper introduces “Familiness” as a Thai, culturally situated framework that embodies warmth, flexibility, and family-like …
Accessibility Analysis Of Hospital Lobbies In Korean Tertiary Hospitals Based On Space Syntax To Inform Design Strategies,
2026
Department of Interior Architecture and Built Environment, Yonsei University, Korea
Accessibility Analysis Of Hospital Lobbies In Korean Tertiary Hospitals Based On Space Syntax To Inform Design Strategies, Aijing Li, Yun Jeong Choi, Hokyun Lim
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Hospital lobbies are gradually transforming from traditional zones of circulation and waiting into multifunctional public spaces that integrate rest, cultural display, retail services, and social interaction. This study analyzes four tertiary hospitals in Korea using space syntax methods, specifically convex space analysis and visibility graph analysis, to quantitatively examine the integration and visual integration characteristics of various functional zones within the lobby. The analysis provides a systematic assessment of spatial accessibility and visual guidance within the lobby environment. From the perspective of enhancing user experience in healthcare settings, the study identifies four key design strategies aimed at optimizing circulation and …
Dwelling, Making, And Digital Mediation: Mani Stone Piles In Eastern Tibet,
2026
Tianjin University
Dwelling, Making, And Digital Mediation: Mani Stone Piles In Eastern Tibet, Danmeng Xu, Han Sun, Zhijun Peng, Deng Pan, Jing Su
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This study examines mani stone piles in Eastern Tibet as material forms emerging through dwelling, movement, and situated acts of making. Drawing on Tim Ingold’s dwelling perspective and long-term visual ethnography conducted between 2016 and 2025, it shows how mani piles are produced through the embodied selection, carrying, and stacking of stones at passes, riverbanks, and crossroads. Rather than treating these piles primarily as fixed religious symbols or products of prior design intention, we argue that their forms arise from the practical coordination of bodily skill, available materials, topography, ritual habit, and movement through the landscape. It further shows that …
Belonging Across Borders: A Framework For Transnationally Resonant Retail Design,
2026
University of Brighton, United Kingdom
Belonging Across Borders: A Framework For Transnationally Resonant Retail Design, Zakkiya Khan
DRS Biennial Conference Series
As global cities become increasingly transnational, retail environments have become key sites where mobile publics negotiate belonging through spatial and commercial experience. While transnational consumers are widely theorised, the spatial implications of their participation in global retail remain underexplored. This conceptual paper draws from transnational and diaspora studies to argue that retail design operates as a transcultural interface where familiarity and difference coexist, shaping plural modes of belonging. It proposes the concept, ‘Transnationally Resonant Retail Design’, a conceptual framework outlining how affective resonance, cultural mediation, and social recognition foster civic belonging within commercial spaces. These principles are illustrated by the …
Materialising Ecologies Of Intelligence: Learning To Design With And Within More-Than-Human Systems,
2026
The Glasgow School of Art, United Kingdom
Materialising Ecologies Of Intelligence: Learning To Design With And Within More-Than-Human Systems, Marianne Mcara, Zoë Prosser, Kirsty Ross
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Design is evolving from primarily human-centred approaches towards planetary concerns that re-centre more-than-human agency – a perspective that correlates with pressing ecological challenges emerging from global anthropogenic impacts. Against this backdrop, design education that equips graduates with the competencies to engage present and future complex socioecological challenges continue to develop. The authors discuss interconnected drivers that are shaping the wider field and advancing designers' roles before presenting a pedagogical model that supports design students to engage in academic-industry-community collaboration and forms of making to materialise complex systems and evolving epistemologies in accessible and tangible ways. The authors offer insights into …
Co-Creating Connections: How Design, Healthcare, And Museum Actors Experience A Co-Creation Process,
2026
University of Antwerp, Faculty of Design Sciences, Architecture + Interior
Co-Creating Connections: How Design, Healthcare, And Museum Actors Experience A Co-Creation Process, Margo Annemans, Iulia Vescan, Frederik Vandyck, Grietje D'Hollander, Maarten Van Acker, Inge Glazemakers
DRS Biennial Conference Series
In recent years, co-creation has become common in design and healthcare contexts. This paper examines a co-creation process aimed at creating a physical link between a museum park and a child and adolescent psychiatric hospital. Whereas the experiences of end-users are key in co-creation processes, only few studies analyse how research and design actors experience partaking in such process. Therefore, we aim to unravel how a co-creation process is perceived by the various actors involved to ultimately foster improved understanding and collaboration and formulate recommendations for future projects. Through a focused collective autoethnographic approach, we explore the experiences of all …
Mediating More-Than-Human Care: Art, Design And Climate Governance,
2026
Hasselt University, Belgium
Mediating More-Than-Human Care: Art, Design And Climate Governance, Liesbeth Huybrechts, Jaz Hee-Jeong Choi, Rachel Elisabeth Clarke, Louise Mazet, Kana Ohashi
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Art is increasingly mobilised in climate governance and policy, yet often instrumentalised for predefined human agendas of data visualisation, awareness raising, and science communication. This paper explores design research’s role as a mediator of more radical art-driven participation that cultivates more-than-human care ecologies: relational configurations that redistribute sensing, accountability, and decision-making across human and other-than-human actors. Drawing on theories of care and affective politics, we examine how design research can support art-driven participation through a critical literature review. Three illustrative case studies addressing sustainable transitions on an interregional level, urban air pollution, and disaster recovery demonstrate a move from anthropocentric …
Ikigai: Co-Reflection With Ai To Enhance Career Direction Clarity In Design Education,
2026
Inholland University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands
Ikigai: Co-Reflection With Ai To Enhance Career Direction Clarity In Design Education, Claudia Mayer, Wina Smeenk, Giulia Calabretta
DRS Biennial Conference Series
As the design profession becomes increasingly diverse and fluid, many design students struggle to define a clear career direction. Existing reflection practices in education offer support, yet outcomes remain inconsistent due to limited mentoring capacity, uneven role model exposure and ambiguity in emerging roles. This paper investigates how the combination of generative AI and facilitated human reflection can support students in increasing their perceived career direction clarity. We present the results of an explorative investigation on IkigAI, an educational workshop combining the Japanese ikigai framework with GenAI as a co-reflective partner. Human reflection and three rounds of GenAI interaction with …
Design Activism Pedagogy: Learning And Negotiating Values In Practice,
2026
Federal University of Paraná, Brazil
Design Activism Pedagogy: Learning And Negotiating Values In Practice, Gheysa Caroline Prado
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper examines how design education can reveal and negotiate values through the practice of design activism. Based on a multi-year teaching experience with undergraduate design students, the study reflects on how pedagogical strategies oriented by emancipation and collective responsibility enable the articulation of ethical awareness in design processes. The teaching approach evolved from remote reflection-based activities to embodied, field-based interventions that addressed social and environmental issues in local communities. Through qualitative analysis of classroom documentation and student projects, the study identifies values such as reciprocity, dignity, and solidarity as emerging drivers of learning and design action. The discussion highlights …
