Participatory Design As An Epistemic Practice: Designing For Institutional Responsiveness In The Scottish Parliament,
2026
The Glasgow School of Art, United Kingdom
Participatory Design As An Epistemic Practice: Designing For Institutional Responsiveness In The Scottish Parliament, Cara Broadley
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper examines Participatory Design (PD) as an epistemic practice that can strengthen how democratic institutions listen and respond to diverse forms of knowledge. Drawing on the PARliament Engagement project, it explores how creative approaches can reveal and reshape the interpretive practices that govern what counts as evidence in parliamentary scrutiny. The research was conducted through a participatory action research process involving ethnographic shadowing, interviews, and co-design workshops with parliamentary staff, creating opportunities for shared reflection on how knowledge is generated, interpreted, and used across scrutiny work. The paper develops the concept of institutional responsiveness to describe how PD can …
Beyond The Gallery: Neurodivergent Digital Access In Australian Museums,
2026
RMIT University;
National Museum of Australia
Beyond The Gallery: Neurodivergent Digital Access In Australian Museums, Jorge E. Arreola Rosendo
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Australian museums invest heavily in hybrid and immersive gallery technologies yet treat their websites, where many neurodiverse visitors seek essential planning information, as static brochures. As 15 to 20 percent of the global population is neurodivergent, this oversight affects a significant audience. This study presents the first Australian audit of neurodivergent accessibility across 43 museums, revealing major disconnects: 86% offer minimal digital experiences despite their accessibility potential, and 35% provide no neurodivergent resources. While many claim consultation, neurodivergent voices remain absent from digital design. Shared digital infrastructure across museum networks creates sector-wide intervention points, since improving centralised systems could enhance …
The Culture Communications Model: Visual Sensemaking And The Everyday In Design Practice,
2026
Design, Luleå Tekniska Universitet, Sweden
The Culture Communications Model: Visual Sensemaking And The Everyday In Design Practice, Patrick Sundqvist, Åsa Wikberg-Nilsson, Lennart Pettersson
DRS Biennial Conference Series
The Culture Communications Model (CCM) provides a framework for structured sensemaking grounded in everyday visual culture. It assists designers and non-designers in navigating complex contexts through four interrelated domains – physical, social, commercial and media – each examined via interpretive filters such as norms, gender, class, power and capital. Through iterative processes of finding, understanding and synthesizing, the CCM structures visual inquiry as an embodied and dialogical practice. By translating observations through these filters and reconfiguring them with conceptual tools, users can reveal hidden relationships, challenge assumptions and generate new perspectives on context and identity. The model transforms diffuse contextual …
Exploring How Packaging Transparency And Processing Level Affect Acceptance Of Edible Insects In Taiwan,
2026
National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan
Exploring How Packaging Transparency And Processing Level Affect Acceptance Of Edible Insects In Taiwan, Wei-Chen Chiu, Chun-Heng Ho
DRS Biennial Conference Series
As global food systems face growing sustainability challenges, edible insects are emerging as a viable alternative protein source. This study explores how transparent window size and food processing level in packaging affect Taiwanese consumers’ purchase intentions toward insect-based foods. A 2 (window size: small vs. large) by 3 (processing level: unprocessed, semi-processed, fully processed) experiment with 359 participants, categorized by attitudes into acceptance and rejection groups, revealed that processing level significantly influenced purchase intention. Fully processed products received the highest acceptance across both groups. Window size had a minor effect, slightly increasing purchase intention among the rejection group when smaller …
Dialoguing With Design: How Llms Mediate Multimodal Workflows In Zero-Waste Fashion,
2026
The University of Edinburgh
Dialoguing With Design: How Llms Mediate Multimodal Workflows In Zero-Waste Fashion, Ping Li, Sarah Kettley, Mal James, Niki Taylor
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This study investigates how large language models (LLMs) enable new modes of collaboration in zero-waste fashion design, addressing the challenge that traditional practice relies heavily on tacit knowledge developed through iterative material experimentation. Using first-person autoethnography, the research examines how a designer collaborates with ChatGPT and Claude across concept ideation, digital pattern development, toile construction, and sample production, tracing how technical terminology, design reasoning, and material knowledge are negotiated, misinterpreted, and re-articulated in human–AI interaction. Findings demonstrate that ChatGPT excels at generative conceptual prompting, whereas Claude better handles complex pattern-cutting rules; nevertheless, both require iterative, dialogue-based correction. The research proposes …
When Grief Takes Shape: Codesigning Creative Modalities In Grief Support Groups For Children,
2026
University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
When Grief Takes Shape: Codesigning Creative Modalities In Grief Support Groups For Children, Kirstine Neimann Skov, Eva Knutz, Thomas Markussen
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Research highlights the positive impact of creative modalities, such as drawings and images, in grief practice for children. However, more knowledge is needed to guide grief practitioners regarding the effects and contributions of these modalities to children’s coping strategies and wellbeing. This paper investigates the use of creative modalities in Danish grief support groups for children through a study involving participatory design research. The study provides a comprehensive overview of how creative modalities can support grieving processes and lay new ground for future work in codesigning creative modalities for and with practitioners and children. The concept of grief as an …
Speculative Woolgathering: Using Design Approaches To Explore Values In The Uk Wool Supply Chain To Enable Digital Good,
2026
Lancaster Univiersity, United Kingdom
Speculative Woolgathering: Using Design Approaches To Explore Values In The Uk Wool Supply Chain To Enable Digital Good, Naomi Jacobs, Emily Birch, Peter Craigon, Katherine Drury, Anabel Gutierrez Mendoza, Louise Manning, David Perez
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper presents an interdisciplinary project using speculative design to explore the intersections of sustainability and technology in the UK Wool industry. Through a process of value mapping, worldbuilding, design fiction, and card development, the project involved stakeholders across the wool supply chain who contributed their perspectives and priorities. This process revealed how value is created in the wool industry, and how relationships and systems are mediated by hidden, often contrasting values. Findings highlight the importance of these values in shaping sustainable and equitable futures for the sector. We present a conceptual framework of valuation, revaluation and evaluation as a …
Material Awareness And Meaning-Making: Leather In Handbag Design,
2026
Estonian Academy of Arts, Estonia
Material Awareness And Meaning-Making: Leather In Handbag Design, Jaana Päeva
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This article explores how material properties and sustainability awareness shape aesthetic perception in leather handbag design. Drawing on practice-based research, the study combines memory collection, collaborative designer-led prototyping and user feedback to examine designer and consumer experiences. Findings show that designers focus on structural and tactile qualities—stiffness, thickness, and texture—while aesthetic attributes such as colour and surface finish support conceptual and stylistic intentions. Sustainable tanning methods and innovative leathers introduce new challenges, requiring adaptive strategies. For users, long-term interaction with leather fosters appreciation for durability, patina, and cultural meaning, shifting aesthetic evaluation from immediate visual appeal to qualities signalling longevity …
Changing The Lens: Micro-Systemic Change Through Design Interventions,
2026
Lancaster University, United Kingdom
Changing The Lens: Micro-Systemic Change Through Design Interventions, David Perez, Nuri Kwon
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper examines how design-led activities function as micro-systemic interventions that can influence people’s perceptions, actions and decision-making towards the futures. Using the optical metaphor of a design lens, we reinterpret Voros’ (2003) Futures Cone as a flexible field of vision that can be focused, dispersed, or magnified through design. The “design lens” serves as a conceptual framework comprising three components: design settings, information, and collectiveness. We apply this lens to two projects: a speculative walking workshop for policymaking, and a creative engagement project with residents in a social housing redevelopment. The aim is to examine how these elements interacted …
Queering Portobello Promenade: Testing ‘Queer’ Inclusive Spatial Design And Thinking.,
2026
Leeds Beckett University, United Kingdom
Queering Portobello Promenade: Testing ‘Queer’ Inclusive Spatial Design And Thinking., Kirsty Watt, Anna Reid
DRS Biennial Conference Series
The intersection of queerness and spatial practice has often been framed through the presence of queer individuals rather than queerness as a spatial principle that can shape and create opportunities within the built environment. While individual identity remains important, this paper argues that applying a queer-informed spatial approach to architecture and landscape architecture introduces broader inclusive design considerations often absent in binary or heteronormative practice. The paper examines this through situating current theory and practice; and then testing these ideas in a speculative design proposal for Portobello Promenade. Through themes including adaptability, queer ecologies, accessibility, safety and visibility, the project …
Heterodox Economic Perspective For Designing Sustainability Transitions: Integrating Fundamental Human Needs And The Milieu Approach,
2026
Mines Saint-Etienne, Univ Lyon, CNRS, Univ Jean Monnet, Univ Lumière Lyon 2, Univ Lyon 3 Jean Moulin, ENS Lyon, ENTPE, ENSA Lyon, UMR 5600 EVS, Institut Henri Fayol, F - 42023 Saint-Etienne France;
Univ. Bordeaux, CNRS, Bordeaux INP, I2M, UMR 5295, F-33400 Talence, France;
Arts et Métiers Institute of Technology, CNRS, Bordeaux INP, I2M, UMR 5295, F-73375 Le Bourget-du-Lac, France
Heterodox Economic Perspective For Designing Sustainability Transitions: Integrating Fundamental Human Needs And The Milieu Approach, Maxime Ritouet, Audrey Tanguy, Tatiana Reyes, Valérie Laforest
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Design for sustainability transitions is an emerging field within design for sustainability that aims to provide guidelines and strategies to generate systemic change in society, mostly at the socio-technical system level. Nevertheless, some limitations of current approaches have been pointed out by scholars, including their market-centered perspective and the vague definition of the sustainability visions adopted. To overcome these limitations, a shift towards a heterodox economic perspective is needed. Such a shift could help define new goals for design – satisfying fundamental human needs – through an integrative vision of humans within their environment. The city scale appears particularly appropriate …
Is There Limitless Romance Behind A “Bunch Of Ones And Zeros”? How Social Vr Shapes Romantic Interaction And Its Design Implications,
2026
Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, Hungary
Is There Limitless Romance Behind A “Bunch Of Ones And Zeros”? How Social Vr Shapes Romantic Interaction And Its Design Implications, Ágnes Karolina Bakk, David Redmond, Borbála Tölgyesi, Kata Szita
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This study explores how romantic relationships and expressions of intimacy unfold within social virtual reality (SVR) environments such as VRChat. Drawing on virtual ethnography and 26 semi-structured interviews, it examines how embodiment, anonymity, and technological affordances shape trust, emotional intimacy, and sexual expression. While often framed as taboo, these dynamics are central to understanding relational practices in immersive environments. Findings show that intimacy is experienced as both emotionally authentic and technologically mediated, emerging through practices such as roleplay, virtual touch, and shared activities. The study highlights how anonymity simultaneously enables openness and introduces challenges around trust, consent, and safety. By …
Toward Speculation Otherwise: Correspondence And Contamination In Design Engagements With Urban Renewal,
2026
IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Toward Speculation Otherwise: Correspondence And Contamination In Design Engagements With Urban Renewal, Anna-Mamusu Sesay Wehlitz, Thomas Binder
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper explores speculation otherwise by tracing how speculative potential emerges from the very first encounters of design research. Rather than viewing speculation as a designer-led projection of possible futures, we propose a shift toward understanding speculation as something to be recognized within already unfolding worlds. Drawing on Tsing’s notion of contamination and Ingold’s concept of correspondence, we show how design engagements evolve through entanglements with speculative forces circulating in the everyday: through material residues, infrastructural rhythms, social negotiations, and more-than-human relations. Through slow alignments, tentative invitations, failed funding applications and walks through neighbourhood sites, we describe how our own …
Designing Motion Identity: Exploring The Aesthetic Expression Of Brand Style Through System Motion,
2026
Hunan University, China, People's Republic of China
Designing Motion Identity: Exploring The Aesthetic Expression Of Brand Style Through System Motion, Xinyi Xie, Yinman Guo, Zican Chen
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This study investigates how system motion enhances aesthetic experience and shapes users’ interpretation of brand style. Using Windows 11, macOS, and HarmonyOS as representative cases, the study analyses four categories of system animations through a motor-level framework comprising temporal, spatial, and transformational attributes. Twelve motion samples were coded, and participants evaluated each sample using perceptual adjectives. The results show that consistent attribute patterns across functional categories lead to stable aesthetic tendencies, while differences emerge from how each system repeatedly applies these attributes. These attribute biases create distinct perceptual profiles, indicating that motion can function as a subtle medium for expressing …
The Role Of Packaging In Smart Home Design,
2026
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Massacusetts Institute of Technology;
AgeLab, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Role Of Packaging In Smart Home Design, Nour Al Maalouf, Chaiwoo Lee
DRS Biennial Conference Series
As technology becomes vital to aging independently, its first points of contact such as packaging influence accessibility and confidence. This study examines how older adults engage with technology through packaging. Nineteen Boston-based adults aged 65 to 85 interacted with three smart home kit packaging prototypes. Observations and interviews highlighted four main insights: Participants preferred (1) design that supported independent use, (2) visible organization of all components, (3) easy, tool-free opening, and (4) sustainable, recyclable materials. Ninety-five percent recalled past frustration with packaging that felt like it was meant “for someone else.” These results suggest that designing for longevity means rethinking …
Beyond Situated Ethics: Towards A Practice-Based Understanding Of How Designers Do Ethics,
2026
The Open University, United Kingdom
Beyond Situated Ethics: Towards A Practice-Based Understanding Of How Designers Do Ethics, Samantha Osys
DRS Biennial Conference Series
As discussions about AI and its societal impacts grow, questions about how to practise design responsibly and ethically have become more prominent. This paper examines how designers do ethics in practice, focusing on the relationship between universal frameworks and situated, lived experiences. Conversations with design practitioners reveal that while universal ethical frameworks provide consistency, they often overlook the everyday negotiations designers face in the workplace. Practitioners report that current governance systems, influenced by external regulations, are overly ‘top-down’ and narrowly focused on specific technologies. This approach leaves designers to identify and fill ethical gaps themselves, often through subtle, even covert, …
Putting An Ear To The Ground: Attending To Frictions In Human-Machine-Soil Temporalities,
2026
Dept. of Digital Design and Information Studies, Aarhus University, Denmark
Putting An Ear To The Ground: Attending To Frictions In Human-Machine-Soil Temporalities, Margrete Lodahl Rolighed, Lone Koefoed Hansen
DRS Biennial Conference Series
In this paper we present "Plant-disco", an interactive physical design object that seeks to make activities in soil (e.g. bugs and plant growth) sensible to humans. With this, we discuss how more-than-human temporalities come to surface (such as plant, soil, microorganisms and machine) and how this creates friction in our human perception of time and interaction. The central aspect of the paper is to discuss how the design, as a result of trying to extend human appreciation of nature into soil, also intervenes in human temporalities by engaging with the seemingly slow pace of nature at a time where most …
Navigating Lca In Circular Design: Methodological Barriers When Applying Life Cycle Assessment To Industrial Waste Upcycling Design Decisions,
2026
Aalborg University, Denmark
Navigating Lca In Circular Design: Methodological Barriers When Applying Life Cycle Assessment To Industrial Waste Upcycling Design Decisions, Seidpooyan Ghafoori, Linda Nhu Laursen, Christian Tollestrup
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Industrial designers increasingly valorise pre-consumer waste through upcycling; yet face methodological ambiguities when applying Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for design decision-making. This paper critically examines barriers in using LCA to evaluate circular design strategies for industrial waste metals, plastics, and wood. Through focused literature review of LCA studies and guidelines, this research identifies key methodological tensions: allocation approaches produce contradictory conclusions about upcycling benefits; system boundary definitions inconsistently classify upcycling activities; functional unit choices fundamentally alter comparative results; guideline selection (ISO, GHG Protocol, PEF) creates large variation in results; performance metrics remain application-dependent rather than operational. Findings reveal when LCA …
Preserving Material Integrity: Designing For Value Retention In Imperfect, Discarded Materials,
2026
Aalborg University, Denmark
Preserving Material Integrity: Designing For Value Retention In Imperfect, Discarded Materials, Nikoline Sander, Linda Nhu Laursen
DRS Biennial Conference Series
This paper examines how designers can contribute to the sustainable transition by retaining intrinsic value in imperfect, discarded materials from manufacturing. With European manufacturing generating over 230 million tons of waste annually, potential lies in using such materials at their processing stage as substitutes for virgin materials into new products. Drawing on a Danish research project with 22 material discards, the study categorises and characterises the materials into offcuts, rejected materials, rejected objects, process waste, and excess materials, each varying in imperfection parameters, predictability, variability, and data availability. The analysis examines how designers retain intrinsic value embedded in prior processing …
(Re)Framing Timber Values: Cascade Use Metrics As A Dynamic Policy Tool,
2026
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology-Lausanne (EPFL), RIOT Lab
(Re)Framing Timber Values: Cascade Use Metrics As A Dynamic Policy Tool, Elif Erez-Henderson, Nadja Gaudillière-Jami, Charlotte Malterre-Barthes
DRS Biennial Conference Series
Salvaged timber embodies a paradox of contemporary circularity: despite its capacity to store carbon and its long history of reuse, it remains marginal within modern construction. Its reuse is constrained by regulations that both shape and reflect the material’s value. This paper reframes this paradox through the lens of value fluctuation–how financial, carbon, and social values oscillate and misalign across timber’s successive lives, determining whether it circulates as resource, product, or waste. These sequential uses, known as cascade use, describe an approach to resource management that prioritizes biomass retention. Building on this framework, the paper proposes a value-centered cascade-use metric …
