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Touch Wood: Stuckness, Risk Assessment, And Embodied Knowledge In Practice, Hugo Glover Jun 2026

Touch Wood: Stuckness, Risk Assessment, And Embodied Knowledge In Practice, Hugo Glover

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This practice-based research explores stuckness in creative work not as a problem to eliminate, but as a threshold state where tacit knowledge becomes operative. Drawing on autoethnographic narrative, I examine how attending to stuckness reveals the autonomic nervous system's (ANS) role in embodied knowing. Through a close reading of wood carving practice, I document how physical engagement with materials offered a way to work with, rather than overcome, stuckness. When invited to exhibit this work, I experienced acute stress that led me to adapt a Risk Assessment form—typically used for physical hazards—to map emotional risks such as shame and humiliation. …

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Material Articulation: Toward An Ornamental Thinking In Digital Tectonics, Ali Etemadi Esfarjani, Manuel Kretzer Jun 2026

Material Articulation: Toward An Ornamental Thinking In Digital Tectonics, Ali Etemadi Esfarjani, Manuel Kretzer

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This research explores ornament as a form of material intelligence in large-scale additive manufacturing. Through the evolution of two design case studies, this paper investigates how micro-scale design articulation evolves from surface tectonics to the traces of the machine’s toolpath and material behaviour. One reveals itself as an organic, agent-based, data-informed modulation. The other integrates a woven toolpath strategy that transforms 3D printing into a spatial composition. Considering ornament not only as an aesthetic element but as a manifestation of process creates a dialogue between matter, performance, and application. With the help of computational design and data, this intervention expands …

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Computational User Research For A Public Helpline For Continuous Service Improvement: Parents Anonymous® As A Service Ecosystem, Ali O. Ilhan, Elizabeth C. Harris, Isil Oygur Jun 2026

Computational User Research For A Public Helpline For Continuous Service Improvement: Parents Anonymous® As A Service Ecosystem, Ali O. Ilhan, Elizabeth C. Harris, Isil Oygur

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Parents Anonymous®, a social service agency, provides a comprehensive ecosystem of supports to parents through its National Parent & Youth Helpline and mutual support groups. The verbal support provided through the Helpline is the core of this public service. We present a computational user research approach that learns from call transcripts to guide continuous improvement across the helpline–group system. From real conversations, we extract clear, actionable signals: how emotions shift during a call, which needs recur over time and when people are most likely to reach out. These insights feed back into everyday practice: refining counsellors’ training and responses, timing …

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Between Assistance And Autonomy: The Home As A Field For Inclusive Design, Eloïse Ravet Jun 2026

Between Assistance And Autonomy: The Home As A Field For Inclusive Design, Eloïse Ravet

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As new forms of bodily vulnerability emerge, personal objects play a crucial role in preserving identity and protecting everyday routines. In the context of home care, the domestic environment becomes a site of ongoing adjustment, where objects are assessed and modified in response to changing physical abilities. This paper proposes a reflection on the potential of inclusive design when applied to the home environment, and its role in supporting ageing at home. Drawing on observations of domestic situations and interviews conducted with residents and healthcare professionals, we aim to reveal the tension between assistance and autonomy, between the adaptability of …

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Strategic Positioning In Design Agencies: Achieving Optimal Distinctiveness Through Portfolios, Bingqing Tian, Antonius Van Den Broek, Mikko Koria Jun 2026

Strategic Positioning In Design Agencies: Achieving Optimal Distinctiveness Through Portfolios, Bingqing Tian, Antonius Van Den Broek, Mikko Koria

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The growing recognition of design’s value to business and society has driven rapid expansion in the design industries, intensifying competition among designers and design firms. Despite an increased scholarly attention to the strategic role of design, there is a lack of understanding how design businesses strategize and position themselves in the market. We aim to revitalise this debate by reviewing a diverse range of literatures on strategic positioning of design agencies and suggest a focus on the theory of optimal distinctiveness. This theory argues that to be successful, firms need to find an optimal balance between being different to be …

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Code Ecologies: Reclaiming Design As Meaning-Making Within Human–Ecological Systems, Laura Santamaria Jun 2026

Code Ecologies: Reclaiming Design As Meaning-Making Within Human–Ecological Systems, Laura Santamaria

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper reclaims the role of design as a practice of meaning-making within human–ecological systems. While meaning has always been part of design discourse, successive turns – semiotic, experiential, relational – have addressed what meaning is without asking why living systems make meaning at all. Drawing on recent advances in neuroscience, biosemiotics and code biology, it argues that meaning-making is not a cognitive phenomenon unique to humans but a regulatory process intrinsic to living systems. Code Ecologies offers a philosophical framework that reinterprets the biosphere, technosphere and semiosphere as interdependent ecologies of codes, resonant with relational and Indigenous cosmologies. The …

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Support Designer’S Wellbeing: Understanding Resilience In Design Education As A Wicked Challenge, Yilin Quan, Matthew Isherwood, Ji Han Jun 2026

Support Designer’S Wellbeing: Understanding Resilience In Design Education As A Wicked Challenge, Yilin Quan, Matthew Isherwood, Ji Han

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Design students are expected to engage with wicked problems as part of their learning. Since these problems have no definitive solutions, the learning process can be challenging and may negatively affect students’ wellbeing. Cultivating resilience becomes critical. Although the conceptualisation of designer resilience has gained attention, it remains underexplored. This paper proposes a new conceptual model of resilience in design education, suggesting two capacity clusters: one emphasising short-term recovery and balance restoration, and the other focusing on long-term sustained engagement. It further frames resilience cultivation in design education as a wicked problem in itself, characterised by the inherent complexity within …

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Exploring Circular Economy Strategies In The Fashion Industry: A Comparative Case Study Analysis, Gabriela Fabro Cardoso, Alessandra Spagnoli Jun 2026

Exploring Circular Economy Strategies In The Fashion Industry: A Comparative Case Study Analysis, Gabriela Fabro Cardoso, Alessandra Spagnoli

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The transition toward a more circular economy is closely linked to the extent to which fashion brands incorporate sustainability principles into their retail communication, and operational practices. This paper explores circularity strategies within the fashion industry through a comparative case study analysis and data were collected through a systematic desktop review of publicly available sources. The analytical framework is structured around three key themes (Advocacy, Actions, and Transparency) through which brands engage consumers, implement circular operations, and communicate measurable impact specifically within the distribution and consumption phase. Additionally, the study discusses the role of Design as an enabler of circularity, …

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Co-Designing Academic Archives: Design-Led Frameworks For Post-Digital Cultural Heritage, Ana Luísa Marques, Juliana F. Duque, Filipe Figueiredo Jun 2026

Co-Designing Academic Archives: Design-Led Frameworks For Post-Digital Cultural Heritage, Ana Luísa Marques, Juliana F. Duque, Filipe Figueiredo

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Building an information legacy requires method: identifying, selecting, and cataloguing information that can anchor future research demands a thorough archiving process, with accurate information access and rigorous preservation practice. Yet academic archives today must also respond to a broader cultural condition shaped by digital transformation and interdisciplinary collaboration. This paper discusses the development of an academic design archive as part of the wider GLAM ecosystem, where preservation, innovation and digital transformation coexist. It proposes a design-led framework that approaches archiving as a cultural and participatory process. Through literature review and institutional reflection, the study highlights the archive’s dual role: collecting …

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From Appraisal To Affect: Designing A Playful Activity For Social Emotional Learning Among Children, Jonathan Sawian, Aditi Sharma Jun 2026

From Appraisal To Affect: Designing A Playful Activity For Social Emotional Learning Among Children, Jonathan Sawian, Aditi Sharma

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The National Education Policy of India (2020) states that Social Emotional Learning (SEL) is essential towards student’s holistic development. While existing curricula provide structured guidance and learning, they often lack playful and participatory elements to engage children in the learning process. This paper describes the design and evaluation of a non-digital, co-operative and playful activity called Bhavna Chakra (Wheel of Emotions) which aims to teach children about emotional awareness using Plutchik’s Wheel of Emotions. The study proposes a design framework based on cognitive appraisal theory, narrative structure and social play. A within-subjects study with 40 students (ages 11–12) from low …

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Material Agents At Work In Alternative Food Networks, Cagri G. Varli, Stefano Maffei Jun 2026

Material Agents At Work In Alternative Food Networks, Cagri G. Varli, Stefano Maffei

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Despite growing interest in sustainable food systems, their material dimension as active design agents (artefacts and infrastructures) remains largely unrecognized. This study challenges the positioning of packaging and distribution tools as passive elements, repositioning them as entities that shape the ongoing negotiation of ethics, responsibility, and co-dependence within food systems. Drawing on interviews, thing ethnography, and relational mapping across two alternative food network case studies, the study examines the roles of these material agents. The findings show that material artefacts contribute to the organization of care, responsibility, and continuity across both pragmatic and symbolic dimensions of food networks. Differences in …

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Drawing In The Minor Key: An Approach For Multi-Actor Designing For Societal Transformation, Caroline Hummels Jun 2026

Drawing In The Minor Key: An Approach For Multi-Actor Designing For Societal Transformation, Caroline Hummels

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As a society, we are confronted with polycrisis. An epistemic shift, that means shifting our way of knowing and changing our ways of looking at complex societal issues, is necessary to be able to transform our practices. Tim Ingold offers such an epistemic shift through the concept of ‘minor key’, fostering open-endedness, imagination, and experimentation. Designing for transformation in the minor key requires different forms of co-creating and communicating. In contrast to a major key, closed style of visualising, minor key drawing might fit, due to its potential for imperfection, open-endedness and imagination. In this pictorial, I’ll reflect on a …

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Efficiency And Empathy: Integrating Ai Into User Research In An Undergraduate Ux Design Course, Nan Hu Jun 2026

Efficiency And Empathy: Integrating Ai Into User Research In An Undergraduate Ux Design Course, Nan Hu

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The integration of AI into UX design presents both opportunities and challenges for UX education-how to leverage AI’s efficiency while developing students’ human skills. This pilot study examines LLMs as an analytical AI co-pilot in undergraduate user research. Students (N=17) conducted two cycles of user research: one using traditional methods, and another with Claude-assisted analysis. Findings show 14 (82%) of students perceived the Claude-assisted approach as faster in synthesizing data and extracting insights. However, the results also reveal a trade-off: AI's efficiency may reduce empathy-building, with 6 (35%) students reporting diminished user connection. This research illuminates the inherent tension in …

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Cianalas: How Scottish Dementia Friendly Communities Shaped Design For Wellbeing Research, Lucy Robertson, Christopher Sze Chong Lim Jun 2026

Cianalas: How Scottish Dementia Friendly Communities Shaped Design For Wellbeing Research, Lucy Robertson, Christopher Sze Chong Lim

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper reflects on how two dementia-friendly communities (DFCs) in Scotland shaped participatory research exploring interactive textiles for wellbeing. Drawing on two practice-based studies in Scotland, study 1 which was based in the Outer Hebrides and the study 2 based in both the Outer Hebrides and East Lothian; it explores how place, geography, culture, and community influence participation and sense-making. Using Research through Design (RtD) and person-centred methods, both projects engaged participants using or making interactive textiles. Comparing the two locations shows that the remoteness of the Hebrides, the Gaelic language, the historical textile industry and the surrounding environments fostered …

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Collective Handiness In Prospective Design: Philosophical Musings On A Serious Play Workshop On Articulation Work, Polyana Andrade Tavares, Rodrigo Freese Gonzatto, Frederick M.C. Van Amstel Jun 2026

Collective Handiness In Prospective Design: Philosophical Musings On A Serious Play Workshop On Articulation Work, Polyana Andrade Tavares, Rodrigo Freese Gonzatto, Frederick M.C. Van Amstel

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Building on the German philosopher Heidegger, design philosophy has historically dealt with handiness (zuhandenheit/vorhandenheit) as an ontological relationship between an individual, a technology, and an artificial world. Such handiness conceptualization does not account for the social accumulation of work necessary to bring technology ready-to-specific-hands. Building on the work of Brazilian philosopher Vieira Pinto, this investigation foregrounds the collective aspect of handiness to account for the articulation work behind a new design philosophy program, prospective design. This program embraces philosophy through design; therefore, this investigation includes a description of a stakeholder mapping workshop in which serious play was used to develop …

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Territorial Quest | A Phygital Urban Game For Public Design Education, Leonardo Moiso Jun 2026

Territorial Quest | A Phygital Urban Game For Public Design Education, Leonardo Moiso

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Design education increasingly unfolds across studio, city and digital platforms, yet these environments are rarely orchestrated as coherent learning ecologies. This paper presents Territorial Quest, a location-aware, game-based activity embedded in a master’s level systemic and service design studio. The intervention turns urban exploration into a structured, data-driven process: student teams investigate different neighbourhoods, collect and categorise contextual data through shared digital tools, and participate in a lightweight scoring system that makes fieldwork visible and comparable. Using a research-through-design and design-based approach, the study combines questionnaires, digital trace data and qualitative feedback to examine how Territorial Quest shapes learning. Findings …

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Framing Data Choices: How Pre-Donation Exploration Designs Influence Data Donation Behavior And Decision-Making, Zeya Chen, Zach Pino, Ruth Schmidt Jun 2026

Framing Data Choices: How Pre-Donation Exploration Designs Influence Data Donation Behavior And Decision-Making, Zeya Chen, Zach Pino, Ruth Schmidt

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Data donation, an emerging user-centric data collection method for public sector research, faces a gap between participant willingness and actual donation. This suggests a design absence in practice: while promoted as "donor-centered" with technical and regulational advances, a design perspective on how data choices are presented and intervene on individual behaviors remain underexplored. In this paper, we focus on pre-donation data exploration, a key stage for adequately and meaningful informed participation. Through a real-world data donation study (N=24), we evaluated three data exploration interventions (self-focused, social comparison, collective-only). Findings show choice framing impacts donation participation. The "social comparison" design (87.5%) …

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Design For Coastal Futures: Rethinking Space And Time With A More-Than-Human And Transcultural Lens., Serena Pollastri, Juan Montalvan Lume, Louise Mullagh, Suzana Ilic Jun 2026

Design For Coastal Futures: Rethinking Space And Time With A More-Than-Human And Transcultural Lens., Serena Pollastri, Juan Montalvan Lume, Louise Mullagh, Suzana Ilic

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Amid the intensifying challenges of climate change, there is an emerging consensus within coastal academic and practitioner networks on the importance of integrating design led-approaches that enhance resilience and foster the long-term adaptation for coastal communities. However, coastal environments present peculiar contexts for design actions, as the movement of water consistently challenges the boundaries between water and land, along with the relational interactions between human and non-human communities—both in cyclical and unpredictable ways. Drawing from the authors’ experiences in tidal coastal and estuarine areas across diverse geographies, this article proposes ways to cultivate design’s response-ability (Haraway, 2016) to the more-than-human …

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A Messy Substance: Mediating The Stigma And Lived Experience Of Endometriosis Through Participatory Design, Carolina Vaz-Pires, Ricardo Melo Jun 2026

A Messy Substance: Mediating The Stigma And Lived Experience Of Endometriosis Through Participatory Design, Carolina Vaz-Pires, Ricardo Melo

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Endometriosis is a chronic condition often surrounded by taboo, silence, and misunderstanding. Although diagnostic uncertainty and epistemic tensions shape endometriosis care, little is known about how design can address the communicative and relational gaps between patients and gynaecologists. This article investigates how participatory and speculative design can support communication between these groups. Using a Research through Design approach, three co-design workshops were conducted with six individuals with endometriosis and five doctors. Participants created analogue artefacts including empathy maps, body maps, clay representations, written narratives, speculative futures and collective posters that materialised embodied pain, emotional burden and clinical perspectives. The workshops …

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Towards Positional Citizenship: Designing For The More-Than-Human Political, Vanessa Monna, Abhigyan Singh, Natalia Romero Herrera Jun 2026

Towards Positional Citizenship: Designing For The More-Than-Human Political, Vanessa Monna, Abhigyan Singh, Natalia Romero Herrera

DRS Biennial Conference Series

“We have never been modern” wrote Bruno Latour, proposing that the dualism between nature and society has represented a convenient fiction. If humans have never genuinely stood apart, what happens to one of its most anthropocentric fabrications, citizenship? Conventionally a marker of political agency, citizenship determines who can speak, act, and belong. This conceptualisation excludes the multiple more-than-human agents shaping collective experiences. Building upon Plessner’s concept of positionality, the paper introduces “Positional Citizenship” to transcend the Cartesian divide between humans and more-than-humans, reshaping the political as a relational space of co-presence. Building on this shift, design becomes a practice of …

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Exploring Embodiment’S Impact On Autonomy And Agency In Behavioral Design, Ruth Schmidt Jun 2026

Exploring Embodiment’S Impact On Autonomy And Agency In Behavioral Design, Ruth Schmidt

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The field of behavioral design uses insight into humans’ cognitive tendencies to help people make better, more rational choices. Yet individuals’ perceptions of what seems rational—let alone viable, or even conceivable—are not universally shared and are often informed by their embodiment as much as cognition. For example, fear of being scolded can inhibit overweight or obese individuals from seeking preventive healthcare, people with ‘invisible’ disabilities may feel pressured to pass as able-bodied to fit in, and Black individuals may avoid ordinary activities likely to prompt ‘birding while Black’ confrontations. Depicting cognition as the single site of judgment and decision-making therefore …

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Data And The Changing Landscape Of Architectural Intelligence, Elizabeth Bowie Christoforetti, Andrew Witt Jun 2026

Data And The Changing Landscape Of Architectural Intelligence, Elizabeth Bowie Christoforetti, Andrew Witt

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The paper addresses emerging and potential changes to the core expertise and structural frameworks of architectural practice in an era of human-machine collaboration and transdisciplinary design, utilizing history and theory to situate the current condition of the profession and its socio-technical infrastructure. The role and relationships defining the architect within society are dissected in light of practical uses of artificial intelligence, highlighting the rapidly evolving ways in which our relationships with site, construction, collaborators, and even the fundamental DNA of the building as an artifact are shifting in the transition from digitization to digitalization. Activities surrounding data collection, classification, process …

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The Parliament Of Things: Shape-Changing Materials As Amplifiers Of Interspecies Relation Design, Yi Sui, Beatrice Bianco, Marinella Ferrara Jun 2026

The Parliament Of Things: Shape-Changing Materials As Amplifiers Of Interspecies Relation Design, Yi Sui, Beatrice Bianco, Marinella Ferrara

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper explores shape-changing materials as agents of material diplomacy within More-than-Human Design. Drawing from Latour’s Parliament of Things, posthumanism, and new materialism, it investigates how responsive materials mediate ecological and interspecies relations. Through a multiple-case study approach, ten design projects are analyzed using a five-dimensional framework—environmental attunement, ecological flourishing, expressive vitality, co-existence and augmentation, and relational mediation. The analysis explores how these materials can perform communicative and political roles, positioning design as a diplomatic practice that negotiates shared concerns among species, technologies, and environments. It attempts to question extractivist models, support ecological repair, and cultivate forms of interspecies attentiveness. …

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Design For Healthy Ageing: Developing And Applying A Resource Model, Yumei Dong, Hua Dong, Tingting Wang, Richard H. M. Goossens Jun 2026

Design For Healthy Ageing: Developing And Applying A Resource Model, Yumei Dong, Hua Dong, Tingting Wang, Richard H. M. Goossens

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The sustainable development of an ageing society necessitates active participation of older people, requiring effective integration of their individual and collective resources into design. However, designers’ understanding of older people’s resources is rather limited. This study aims to develop a conceptual model of older people’s resources to support design for healthy ageing. Through literature review and interviews with 19 recently retired Dutch seniors, twelve resource types were identified, categorised into six dimensions: practical, emotional, intellectual, social, cultural, and time. These categories were synthesised into a Diamond Model of Resources. The framework, encompassing both resource categories and the Diamond Model, was …

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Weaving Visual Language: Encoding Gaelic In Tartan Length To Facilitate Interaction With Endangered Languages, Emmie Drummond, Dr Loraine Clarke, Miriam Sturdee, Freya Macleod Jun 2026

Weaving Visual Language: Encoding Gaelic In Tartan Length To Facilitate Interaction With Endangered Languages, Emmie Drummond, Dr Loraine Clarke, Miriam Sturdee, Freya Macleod

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This project reimagines tartan as a data-physicalization of Scots Gaelic. Extending ‘Radical Gaels’, a psycho-geographic soundscape that maps the identity, geographies and material history of Contemporary Gaels. Weaving Visual Language translates Scots waulking songs and geographies through cryptographic mapping to weave structure, using a Python-based binary matrix encoding system, illustrating the loss of Gaelic oral traditions. The resulting textiles act as linguistic archives and objects of cultural dissent. The project proposes a framework for museums to engage audiences through preserving information within the artefact itself, rather than exterior labelling. Theoretically, this work develops the idea of ‘culturally constrained physicalization’, where …

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Digital Platform To Foster Social Engagement For The Visually Impaired, Mônica Moura, Cristina Portugal, Márcio Guimarães Jun 2026

Digital Platform To Foster Social Engagement For The Visually Impaired, Mônica Moura, Cristina Portugal, Márcio Guimarães

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper details the development and impact of the "Lembrei de Você" (I Remembered You) project, an inclusive design initiative that created a digital platform to combat loneliness and promote autonomy among the visually impaired, especially the elderly, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Using participatory methods, the research led to the creation of a platform that manages and distributes audio messages through a solidarity network of readers and listeners. The study describes the design process, from accessibility requirements to implementation using WordPress. Results show the platform successfully optimized project logistics and fostered an inclusive digital environment, enhancing social interaction …

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Design Education In Multicultural Contexts: Student Perceptions Of Cultural Inclusivity In The Classroom, Jasmine Yiming Sun, Najla Mouchrek Jun 2026

Design Education In Multicultural Contexts: Student Perceptions Of Cultural Inclusivity In The Classroom, Jasmine Yiming Sun, Najla Mouchrek

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Fostering intercultural integration of students of diverse backgrounds is a key concern for design education. This study examines how design students at a culturally-diverse North American university perceive cultural inclusivity in their educational experience and effects on sense of belonging and integration. We surveyed 102 undergraduate and graduate students about expressing cultural identities in the design classroom, cultural inclusivity of learning materials, environment and interactions, and navigating challenging experiences in cross-cultural integration at the school. Although the study found a considerable level of cultural inclusivity, findings suggest that efforts to foster diversity and integration are still necessary, since difficulties seem …

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Collaging Queer Decolonial Worlds: Applied Techniques In Design, Alexandra Eleazar, Cara Flores Jun 2026

Collaging Queer Decolonial Worlds: Applied Techniques In Design, Alexandra Eleazar, Cara Flores

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Collaging is a form of design that references, remixes, and transforms the past, while holding potential for queer decolonial imaginaries. Through bringing together decolonial and queer theories, we propose an exploration of collage as a design technique that seeks to tear through dominant imaginaries to create more emancipatory visualizations. To explore this, we first turn to feminist theoretical understandings of collage, and then ask: how does collaging show up as a distinctly queer and decolonial design practice? Then, we utilize examples from our field work to demonstrate how collage can function as a queer and decolonial design practice that shows …

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Fostering Human-Material Co-Creative Dialogical Relationship: Operationalizing The Art Of Making Through Degeneration, Ye Yang Jun 2026

Fostering Human-Material Co-Creative Dialogical Relationship: Operationalizing The Art Of Making Through Degeneration, Ye Yang

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Moving beyond instrumental rationality that treats materials as passive objects, this study operationalizes the Art of Making (AoM) by proposing a three-dimensional degeneration approach. Degeneration disrupts object fixity, reframing objects as materials in a state of in-betweenness that invites co-creative dialogue. Adopting drawing as a universal making practice, we empirically grounded this proposition through five workshops with ten participants from diverse countries and design backgrounds. By degenerating sensory, bodily, explorative, and social dimensions of drawing products and practices, the resulting state of material-in-between invited participants into dialogical engagements. Findings reveal that this state sparks curiosity, transcends preconceptions, activates subconscious exploration …

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A 4r-Supported Circular Product–Service System For Luxury Branded Events, Ke Ma, Francesca Valsecchi, Yuchen Tan, Mingjia Ji, Junru Shen, Xiaoya Ma, Duan Wu, Jiao Mo, Shijian Zhao Jun 2026

A 4r-Supported Circular Product–Service System For Luxury Branded Events, Ke Ma, Francesca Valsecchi, Yuchen Tan, Mingjia Ji, Junru Shen, Xiaoya Ma, Duan Wu, Jiao Mo, Shijian Zhao

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Temporary luxury branded events run on short cycles and bespoke builds that accelerate material churn. We present a circular phygital product–service system that operationalises the circular economy (CE) through a 4R frame (Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, and Recycling) across warehouse‑to‑event journeys. Developed via a multi‑method design inquiry with a tier‑1 contractor, the system couples physical touchpoints (reusable fold‑flat transit boxes, adjustable racking, standard labels) with digital orchestration (a live digital warehouse, list‑based outbound/inbound workflow, and a sustainable materials library). The architecture aligns roles and decisions, protects and identifies assets, and makes reuse the default under luxury brand constraints. By embedding traceable …

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