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Designing Algorithmic Infrastructures For Environmental Regeneration: Autonomous Systems In Marine Contexts, Oğul Görgülü, Ahmet Can Özcan, Anders Berglund Jun 2026

Designing Algorithmic Infrastructures For Environmental Regeneration: Autonomous Systems In Marine Contexts, Oğul Görgülü, Ahmet Can Özcan, Anders Berglund

DRS Biennial Conference Series

In an era shaped by autonomous systems, designers increasingly confront a central question: how should responsibility and decision-making be distributed when environmental action is partially delegated to algorithms? This article explores how AI infrastructures in marine environmental operations reshape relations between human intention, machine autonomy, and ecological care. Drawing on posthuman design theory, Actor–Network Theory, and explainable AI, the study proposes an Ethics of Autonomy framework that positions design as a mediator between human oversight and algorithmic agency. Using a case-informed analysis of three marine robotic systems—FloatyBoats (coral restoration), Seaswarm (oil spill mitigation), and the autonomous surface vessel Vatoz (marine …

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Modes Of Being Amid Anthropocene: Living Through The 2024 Rio Grande Do Sul Floods, Natalia Dai Prá Penteado, Guilherme Meyer Jun 2026

Modes Of Being Amid Anthropocene: Living Through The 2024 Rio Grande Do Sul Floods, Natalia Dai Prá Penteado, Guilherme Meyer

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper situates the 2024 Rio Grande do Sul climate disaster within the intertwined crises of the Anthropocene, arguing that those impacted developed situated practices to preserve identities and sustain life amidst collapse. Drawing on in-depth interviews with thirteen individuals directly affected by the floods, the research identifies Modes of Being that illuminate strategies of adaptation, care, and continuity rooted in Latin American ontologies. Through the interpretive lenses of Anna Tsing’s concepts of ghosts, monsters, and ruins, these modes reveal how to endure life in the Anthropocene and reconfigure identities and relations to persist. The study proposes a framework of …

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Fostering Emergence In Behavioral Public Policy: A Systemic Behavioral Design Framework, Ruth Schmidt Jun 2026

Fostering Emergence In Behavioral Public Policy: A Systemic Behavioral Design Framework, Ruth Schmidt

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Behavioral public policy design tends to take a top-down, evidence-based approach to prompting behavioral change through mechanisms like ‘nudges.’ Yet behavioral responses to evolving conditions in complex systems—such as the recent No Kings rallies and anti-ICE activities in the US—often manifest as emergent, self-organizing movements, representing a powerful ‘bottom-up’ form of behavioral change that provides an alternative to traditional behavioral policy. This paper proposes a behavioral systems framework to explore the dynamic of behavioral emergence in a systemic context, composed of two matrixed dimensions: 1) micro, meso, and macro system levels; and 2) mechanisms that support behavior, ranging from targeted …

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Mechanical Jewellery As Epimethean Practice: Staying With The Trouble Of Human–Machine Entanglement, Zhiyang Ding, Guang Dai, Beverley Hood, Sarah Kettley Jun 2026

Mechanical Jewellery As Epimethean Practice: Staying With The Trouble Of Human–Machine Entanglement, Zhiyang Ding, Guang Dai, Beverley Hood, Sarah Kettley

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper explores how mechanical jewellery can serve as an Epimethean design practice that rethinks human–machine relationships through care, hesitation, and affective engagement. Drawing from post-anthropocentric design discourse and new materialist theory, the research investigates how low-tech, playful, and speculative prototypes can undo conventional narratives of technological progress. Through a practice-based workshop conducted at Fringe Arts Bath 2025, the study examines how wearable artefacts exhibiting unpredictable motion provoke emotional response and relational awareness in participants. The findings suggest that mechanical jewellery can operate as a modest yet generative medium for staying with the trouble of human–machine entanglement, foregrounding absurd materiality, …

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Youth As Cultural Agents: Facilitating Cultural And Civic Engagement Through Game Design, Carlo De Gaetano, Maarten Groen, Sabine Niederer, Susannah Montgomery Jun 2026

Youth As Cultural Agents: Facilitating Cultural And Civic Engagement Through Game Design, Carlo De Gaetano, Maarten Groen, Sabine Niederer, Susannah Montgomery

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper analyzes four Cultural Game Jams (CGJs) in the Netherlands, conducted within EPIC-WE, a European project exploring how game-making can become a tool for both cultural reflection and dialogue between youth and cultural, educational and creative stakeholders. The jams connected cultural heritage organisations, creative industries, higher education, and young people (15–25) in a Quadruple Helix framework. Across two years, youths designed games that addressed societal issues, cultural heritage, and European values, while their roles evolved from participants to members of a Youth Advisory Board acting as co-designers, research contributors, and co-facilitators. Through cross-case analysis of jam formats, game outcomes, …

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Motivation And Reflective Processes In Service-Learning Design Projects: Insights From A Visual Communication Design Studio, Alejandra Poblete Pérez, Emilio J. Castro-Navarro, Alfredo Mora Briones, Pilar Del Real Westphal, Marcela Cabello Mora Jun 2026

Motivation And Reflective Processes In Service-Learning Design Projects: Insights From A Visual Communication Design Studio, Alejandra Poblete Pérez, Emilio J. Castro-Navarro, Alfredo Mora Briones, Pilar Del Real Westphal, Marcela Cabello Mora

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This study examines structured self-reflection as a formative assessment tool within a Visual Communication Design Studio incorporating the service-learning (S-L) methodology, analysing motivational dynamics experienced by twenty undergraduate students. Using Thematic Analysis of 420 weekly responses, the study draws on Self-Determination Theory (SDT) to map reflections on strengths, weaknesses, and intentions against needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. The analysis revealed a consistent pattern: strengths centred on competence and relatedness, while weaknesses highlighted motivational tensions and emotional blockages regarding self-regulation and project management. The dominant dynamic was the interplay between autonomy and relatedness, with “teamwork” emerging as the most recurrent …

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Learning To Design With Communities: Situated Public Design Education Through The Roots Project In The Gambia, Mireia Sierra, Juan José Ramos, Ramon Bragos Jun 2026

Learning To Design With Communities: Situated Public Design Education Through The Roots Project In The Gambia, Mireia Sierra, Juan José Ramos, Ramon Bragos

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper presents the ROOTS Project, developed by interdisciplinary student teams from Esade, UPC, and IED within Fusion Point's Challenge-Based Innovation framework, in collaboration with IdeaSquare at CERN. As part of a challenge proposed by IDAEA-CSIC (Spain) and the Sankandi Youth Development Association (SYDA, The Gambia), students co-designed low-cost environmental monitoring tools to support community-led mangrove restoration in the River Gambia region. A two-week field deployment in Sankandi embedded the project within a layered local governance structure (the Alkalo, the Village Development Committee, and its Environmental Committee) through which the technology was formally adopted and transferred. Drawing on student reflections …

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Bias Reconsidered: Ecologically Rational Heuristics In Design Cognition, Paul Parsons, Srishti Agrawal, Phuong Bui, Prakash Shukla, Ali Baigelenov Jun 2026

Bias Reconsidered: Ecologically Rational Heuristics In Design Cognition, Paul Parsons, Srishti Agrawal, Phuong Bui, Prakash Shukla, Ali Baigelenov

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Design cognition is often described through a heuristics-and-biases lens that foregrounds systematic errors such as anchoring, fixation, and premature narrowing. Yet in professional practice, the same patterns may function as adaptive strategies for coping with ambiguity, constraint, and ill-defined problems. This paper examines how bias-like tendencies appear in expert data visualization work using a multi-phase qualitative study with 11 professional designers. We analyze situated episodes through two contrastive interpretive lenses: a bias lens that highlights potential distortions, and an adaptive-expertise lens that treats the same tendencies as resource-rational strategies. We situate these interpretations within a broader design cognition perspective, drawing …

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Distributed Care Hubs: Rethinking Disability Care Policy Through Participatory Research, Christina Chi Zhang, Kyra Zimmerman, Austin Duncan, Jiin Jung Jun 2026

Distributed Care Hubs: Rethinking Disability Care Policy Through Participatory Research, Christina Chi Zhang, Kyra Zimmerman, Austin Duncan, Jiin Jung

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper develops the concept of "distributed care hubs" to describe the informal, relational infrastructures through which disabled people sustain everyday life amid insufficient formal care systems. Drawing on participatory research in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania—combining community mapping, ethnographic interviews, and computational analysis—we show how community-built care emerges through ordinary social interactions, shared spaces, and reciprocal relationships. Distributed care hubs reveal that disability care and everyday sociality are inseparable; they challenge independence-centered policy frameworks by foregrounding interdependence as a universal human condition. Yet these hubs remain precarious, functioning as compensatory mechanisms shaped by systemic failures that force disabled people into informal survival …

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Agnes As A Critical Wearable: Mediating Age, Materiality, And Embodied Expertise, Elisa Cardamone, Taylor Brennan, Sophia Ashebir, Lisa D'Ambrosio, Joseph F. Coughlin Jun 2026

Agnes As A Critical Wearable: Mediating Age, Materiality, And Embodied Expertise, Elisa Cardamone, Taylor Brennan, Sophia Ashebir, Lisa D'Ambrosio, Joseph F. Coughlin

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Design is increasingly engaging with the body through soft systems, wearables, and responsive materials, exploring how material interactions shape experiences of care and inclusion. This paper examines the Age Gain Now Empathy System (AGNES) - a wearable suit simulating the chronic physical conditions and functional changes associated with older age - as a critical, soma-focused design intervention. Drawing on auto-ethnographic reflection and participant observation, we present a theoretical and methodological analysis. We argue that AGNES' critical materiality actively mediates how the ageing body is read and made visible, inviting embodied understanding and supporting co-creation partnerships. We analyse how this wearable …

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Intermediary Ecologies And Participatory Infrastructures In Wind Power Planning – Towards A Practice Of Design For Just Transitions, Tessa Laven, Ramia Maze, Niki Wallace Jun 2026

Intermediary Ecologies And Participatory Infrastructures In Wind Power Planning – Towards A Practice Of Design For Just Transitions, Tessa Laven, Ramia Maze, Niki Wallace

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper analyses how transition intermediaries and participatory infrastructures shape an unjust energy licensing process and outlines implications for design for just transitions. Centring on the Fosen Wind Farm in Norway, where wind power development violated Indigenous Sámi cultural rights, it traces how licensing enabled renewable expansion while generating democratic and rights-based conflicts. Using historical case analysis and a synthesis of various literatures, the paper explores the intermediary ecology of licensing and shows how interactions among transition intermediaries structure power asymmetries. In dialogue with design research on infrastructuring, it proposes three practices for design in just transition contexts: unveiling institutional–cultural …

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More Than Weeds: Thickening Designer-Plant Relations In The Sonoran Desert, Andrew James Whitcomb, Marysol Ortega Pallanez Jun 2026

More Than Weeds: Thickening Designer-Plant Relations In The Sonoran Desert, Andrew James Whitcomb, Marysol Ortega Pallanez

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Affective relations among humans and more-than-humans are full of shifts, subtleties, and complexities. Yet, design research often treats feelings as stable instruments to utilize for making sustainable climate futures. Through reflection-on-practice, we untangle impressions and gestures in the field during a design research project in the Sonoran Desert titled Gifts for Tempe. Our reflections focus on shifts in our attention and attachments with an ‘invasive’ plant commonly known as Stinknet. The impressions and gestures reveal designer-researchers’ thick tensions in designing for climate futures. By showing how affective relations with more-than-humans change over time, we identify that climate futuring involves learning …

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Uncovering The Health Impacts Of Extreme Temperatures In Western United States Prisons Through Interdisciplinary Architectural And Epidemiological Methods, Serena Langdon-Dimidjian, Allison Macht, Shawhin Roudbari, Katherine Lemasters, David Ciplet, Elizabeth Corrado, Michael Clifton, Bob Eisman Jun 2026

Uncovering The Health Impacts Of Extreme Temperatures In Western United States Prisons Through Interdisciplinary Architectural And Epidemiological Methods, Serena Langdon-Dimidjian, Allison Macht, Shawhin Roudbari, Katherine Lemasters, David Ciplet, Elizabeth Corrado, Michael Clifton, Bob Eisman

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Mass incarceration is a public health and architectural crisis in the United States. Extreme temperatures present mental and physical health challenges for incarcerated populations, exacerbated by the architectural strategies of carceral spaces. At the intersection of architecture and epidemiology we investigated how participants could leverage architectural drawings to analyze the inhumane temperatures they experienced in state prisons. Through interviews and focus groups with formerly incarcerated people, we found that the method of participatory architectural drawing allowed participants and researchers to spatialize the impact of extreme temperatures on mental and physical health as mediated by architectural space. Through a collaboration between …

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Reframing Architectural Practice Through Territory And Emotion: The Atlas Of Emotions In Bajo Atrato, Colombia, Carolina Saldarriaga-Cardona Jun 2026

Reframing Architectural Practice Through Territory And Emotion: The Atlas Of Emotions In Bajo Atrato, Colombia, Carolina Saldarriaga-Cardona

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This study reframes architectural practice in Bajo Atrato, Colombia, through a relational understanding of territory and emotion, during the implementation of the Peace Agreement. Using a situated research-by-design approach, the study combines field journeys, workshops on emotional cartographies, semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and audiovisual recordings in Carmen del Darién, Marriaga Swamp, Triganá Bay, and Santa María de la Antigua del Darién. These methods consider everyday life, memory, and collective care as forms of territorial knowledge. The recognition of territories, identification of emotions, and the visibility of the Territorial Expressions of Grieving led to the creation of the Atlas of Emotions, …

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The R’S Have It: Navigating The Playground Of Design For Health Through Design Rationale, Bard Wartena, Derek Kuipers Jun 2026

The R’S Have It: Navigating The Playground Of Design For Health Through Design Rationale, Bard Wartena, Derek Kuipers

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper examines how systemic designers in health navigate plural perspectives and overlapping quality regimes. We introduce the Playground of Design as four interconnected spaces of problem, design, change, and solution, together with four R’s, Rapidness, Rigour, Relevance, and Resonance, as conversational lenses for articulating design rationale in plural settings. Two Dutch cases illustrate this approach. Bias Blaster, a serious game for adolescents recovering from psychosis, is reread retrospectively to reconstruct systemic design rationale. E-Health Junior, a long-running e-health consortium, is reconstructed through interviews and translated into a pedagogical workshop for perspective-taking. We argue that combining the Playground of Design …

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Beyond Assumptions: Identity Mapping As A Tool For Inclusive Public Design Learning, Corie Seed, Chiara Del Gaudio Jun 2026

Beyond Assumptions: Identity Mapping As A Tool For Inclusive Public Design Learning, Corie Seed, Chiara Del Gaudio

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Recent studies in Design Education emphasize the importance of teaching Design as a contextually situated practice, and ways for leveraging local knowledges and embracing plural epistemologies. Within this framework, it becomes crucial for designers to be able to acknowledge their own assumptions, biases, and identities and how they influence their design decisions when dealing with cultural complexity. Yet, an effective practice for cultivating this awareness, defined as critical self-reflection, remains underexplored in Design Education. This paper aims to outline key ways to foster the practice of critical self-reflection in teaching and learning Public Design. Drawing on interviews with design educators, …

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Archives And Graphic Memory: 1980s Brazilian Rock Album Covers As Cultural Heritage, Paulo Eduardo Moretto, Priscila Lena Farias Jun 2026

Archives And Graphic Memory: 1980s Brazilian Rock Album Covers As Cultural Heritage, Paulo Eduardo Moretto, Priscila Lena Farias

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The centrality of modernist and institution-centred narratives has narrowed the scope of Brazilian graphic design throughout history, limiting its cultural and epistemological diversity. This article explores the value of researching graphic artefacts normally understood as not pertinent to design research, focusing on album covers from the Brazilian rock scene of the 1980s. Based on the formation of an archive of 155 covers, this study emphasizes the need for appropriate methods to analyse mass-culture artefacts whose wide circulation shapes collective design practices and visual imaginaries. By reflecting on the criteria of selection, interpretation, and preservation that determine what is collected, analysed, …

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Generative Analogical Intelligence: Speculative Co-Design Through The Fabric Of Analogy, Nishra Ranpura Jun 2026

Generative Analogical Intelligence: Speculative Co-Design Through The Fabric Of Analogy, Nishra Ranpura

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is increasingly embedded in creative practice, offering new possibilities for ideation while raising concerns about reduced idea diversity and diminished cognitive engagement. This paper introduces generative analogical intelligence (GAI) as a human-centered approach that foregrounds analogy, material culture, and speculative reasoning to sustain creative thinking. Through a research-through-design (RtD) methodology, the study develops and refines the FABRIC framework (form, action, behavior, relation, intention, context) across three co-design phases involving design students, non-specialists, and design professionals. Findings suggest that analogy-based cross-pollination can reintroduce productive cognitive friction, support both divergent and convergent thinking, and generate varied outcomes. However, …

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Design-Led Ecodesign Implementation: Enabling Product And Organisational Transformation For Sustainability Transitions, Enrica Monticelli, Francesco Zurlo Jun 2026

Design-Led Ecodesign Implementation: Enabling Product And Organisational Transformation For Sustainability Transitions, Enrica Monticelli, Francesco Zurlo

DRS Biennial Conference Series

A research project conducted in a major appliance company investigates how Ecodesign, when implemented through a design-led and cross-functional process, can evolve from a technical activity into a catalyst for organisational transformation. The study examines the application of a company-specific Ecodesign tool designed to guide product development teams and support adaptive change. A conceptual framework integrating Design-Led Innovation, Dynamic Capabilities, and the Multi-Level Perspective is adopted to interpret how design mediates learning across functions. The paper focuses on the Seize phase, when Ecodesign is integrated into new product development routines through pilot projects. These pilots act as experimental settings in …

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Revisiting Kansei Engineering Through Japanese Scholarship: Toward Field Kansei Engineering, Liang Dong, Hong Zhang, Chun-Hsien Chen Jun 2026

Revisiting Kansei Engineering Through Japanese Scholarship: Toward Field Kansei Engineering, Liang Dong, Hong Zhang, Chun-Hsien Chen

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Japan, as the birthplace of Kansei Engineering (KE), has played a pivotal role in shaping this field, building a solid research foundation and accumulating extensive scholarly experience. A substantial body of valuable Japanese-language studies has been published in academic conferences and journals in Japan. However, current English-language review articles in KE rarely include these Japanese works. To address this gap, this study provides a preliminary attempt to compile and analyse Japanese publications that propose new concepts, theories, models, and frameworks within KE. The review highlights distinctive perspectives developed by Japanese scholars, revealing contextual and situational sensitivity, collective and social understanding, …

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Design Research Laboratories: A Historical Review, Lynn Harles Jun 2026

Design Research Laboratories: A Historical Review, Lynn Harles

DRS Biennial Conference Series

In recent decades, Design Research Labs have proliferated across design educational institutions worldwide, emerging as dynamic spaces that challenge traditional pedagogical models. However, understanding this contemporary phenomenon requires contextualizing it within the historical origins of the laboratory metaphor in design—a concept repeatedly reimagined over nearly a century. Building upon Hasenhütl's (2018, 2023) identification of two historical generations from the early to mid-20th century, this research extends the genealogy to encompass contemporary developments, with particular attention to socio-ecological themes. The analysis reveals four distinct generations of Design Research Labs that do not follow strictly linear chronological progression but represent "expanding parameters" …

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Relational Embodiment: Rethinking Artifacts As Mediators Of Being-With-Others, Yufei Zeng, Junjie Zhang Jun 2026

Relational Embodiment: Rethinking Artifacts As Mediators Of Being-With-Others, Yufei Zeng, Junjie Zhang

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Grounded in theories of embodied cognition, extended mind, and mediating artifact, this paper proposes a human–artifact–human perspective to explore the relational mediation of artifacts in social interaction. Through a systematic review of 30 key studies published between 2010 and 2025, a four-dimensional analytical framework is constructed—embodied cues, interaction modes, mediating artifact features, and affective outcomes—to reveal how embodied design generates relations among the body, artifacts, and society. The analysis shows that embodied interaction is shifting from functional control toward relational generation, presenting four tendencies: micro-intimacy, ambient co-presence, culturally embedded bodily rituals, and slow relational rhythms. Building on these insights, the …

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Ai And Thou: Empathy, Artificial Intelligence And Alterity In Design, Matt Sinclair, Peter Buwert Jun 2026

Ai And Thou: Empathy, Artificial Intelligence And Alterity In Design, Matt Sinclair, Peter Buwert

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Empathy is a key differentiator in Nigel Cross' model of Design as a third discipline, and has become established as a vital component of both research and practice. Yet agreed definitions of empathy in design remain elusive, and the roles it should play have been questioned and problematised. Recent developments in the capabilities of Large Language Models have generated discussion of the possibility of both simulated and actual empathic behaviour by artificial intelligences. In this paper we gather and synthesise relevant philosophical debates on the nature and operation of AI-empathy. Concepts of alterity in the work of Martin Buber and …

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The Act Of Crafting Textile Dialogues, Malene Harsaae, Anne Louise Bang Jun 2026

The Act Of Crafting Textile Dialogues, Malene Harsaae, Anne Louise Bang

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper explores how textile dialogues can be crafted within material‑driven de-sign processes in the context of increasing environmental pressure on textile re-sources and forthcoming regulations such as the EU Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation. Through observations of professional practitioners and anal-yses of design students’ thesis work, the study investigates how material‑first ap-proaches influence ideation, prototyping and reflection in apparel and textile de-sign. Practitioners naturally engage in reflection‑in‑action, using craft skills to nego-tiate material behavior and technologies, often leading to unanticipated design di-rections. Students, guided by the material‑driven design model for apparel and tex-tiles, deliberately develop similar dialogues, gaining insights …

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Design As A Mediator: Bridging Traditional Cosmologies And Scientific Knowledge For Climate Change Adaptation Through Value-Led Design, Natascha Ng, Alphayo Lutta Jun 2026

Design As A Mediator: Bridging Traditional Cosmologies And Scientific Knowledge For Climate Change Adaptation Through Value-Led Design, Natascha Ng, Alphayo Lutta

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Sub-Saharan Africa is at the frontline of climate change, with impacts particuarly acute in arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs). This study examines how value-led design can mediate between traditional cosmologies and scientific climate knowledge to strengthen adaptation. Focusing on pastoralist communities in Kenya’s Maasai Mara region, it applies the Multi-Level Perspective (MLP) as a participatory reflection tool. Findings show how value-led design can advance equity by embedding community voices and centring values in decision-making, contributing to broader debates on design’s role in fostering systemic transitions amid climate uncertainty, safeguarding against maladaptation. It presents the MLP as a tool for value-led …

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Learning How To Use Bodystorming In Service Design For Generating New Insights And Ideas: An Application To Out-Of-Hours Primary Care In The Netherlands, Ömer Taha Döver, Monisha Mohan, Dirk Snelders, Nikita Arora, Ruihong Geng, Paula Melo Signerez, Mathé Delissen Jun 2026

Learning How To Use Bodystorming In Service Design For Generating New Insights And Ideas: An Application To Out-Of-Hours Primary Care In The Netherlands, Ömer Taha Döver, Monisha Mohan, Dirk Snelders, Nikita Arora, Ruihong Geng, Paula Melo Signerez, Mathé Delissen

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Bodystorming is a design method for generating new insights and ideas for service improvement through improvised, embodied roleplay. However, it is not easy to learn how to use bodystorming as a generative method. Guidance for learning focuses on how to engage in embodied social-technical interactions, but it does not specify clear goals for wanting to do so. In a case study of an out-of-hours primary care service we explored how goal setting can stimulate novice users to use bodystorming to generate insights and ideas. Over three iterations of bodystorming, a group of novice bodystormers focused on goals that they derived …

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Unstructuring Data, Activating Dialogue: How Situated Knowledges Shape Participatory Systemic Design Practices, Asja Aulisio, Amina Pereno, Martina Spinelli Jun 2026

Unstructuring Data, Activating Dialogue: How Situated Knowledges Shape Participatory Systemic Design Practices, Asja Aulisio, Amina Pereno, Martina Spinelli

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper explores the role of data within participatory systemic design, focusing on how structured and unstructured data influence participation, sensemaking, and representation. Through three interconnected applications, the research examines how systems’ visual representations function as boundary objects that enable dialogue, trust, and shared understanding among diverse actors. Drawing on the concept of unstructuring data, the paper discusses how transforming data from fixed, expert-driven artefacts into open, evolving representations fosters inclusivity and reflexivity in design processes. The findings highlight that structured data support decision-making in well-defined contexts, whereas unstructured data stimulate exploration and collective learning in complex or fragile territories. …

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Designing Knowledge Otherwise: The Bembo Officina Editoriale As A Case For Alternative Academic Publishing, Raimonda Riccini, Simone Spagnol, Giampiero Dalai, Stefania D'Eri, Manuel Zanettin, Giovanni Borga, Luciano Perondi Jun 2026

Designing Knowledge Otherwise: The Bembo Officina Editoriale As A Case For Alternative Academic Publishing, Raimonda Riccini, Simone Spagnol, Giampiero Dalai, Stefania D'Eri, Manuel Zanettin, Giovanni Borga, Luciano Perondi

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper presents Bembo Officina Editoriale (BOE) as a design-research experiment addressing the epistemological, ethical, and technical tensions in contemporary scientific publishing. BOE develops an open-source, automated editorial workflow—based on Markdown–Python pipelines—to generate fully editable InDesign outputs, reducing production costs and enabling accessibility without compromising design quality. Rooted in a non-profit academic framework, the model reclaims editorial autonomy while resisting the inequities of commercial open-access models based on Article Processing Charges. BOE thus proposes an alternative publishing infrastructure where automation sustains pluralism and transparency. The contribution situates this approach within a critical reflection on the historical continuity between typographic rationalization …

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Design For Well-Being: A Preliminary Investigation On Design Interventions In The Context Of Loneliness Economy, Jinxia Liu, Angela Giambattista, Loredana Di Lucchio Jun 2026

Design For Well-Being: A Preliminary Investigation On Design Interventions In The Context Of Loneliness Economy, Jinxia Liu, Angela Giambattista, Loredana Di Lucchio

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Loneliness has become a prominent public health issue that causes negative consequences at both individual and social levels. Concurrently, the market is actively responding and gradually forms the loneliness economy, addressing human emotional needs by offering related products and services. However, the largely implemented digital solutions remain problematic. This paper aims at investigating how design research has addressed the loneliness issue and what roles design plays in addressing loneliness. A mixed methodological approach was adopted, combining analysis of keyword co-occurrence and a meta-narrative review. The results identify the threefold design contributions: building and enhancing social connectedness, creating artificial companions and …

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Crafting Savage Futures: Translanguaging And The Material Politics Of Peripheral Making, Guilherme Meyer, Seher Mirza, Raees Calafato Jun 2026

Crafting Savage Futures: Translanguaging And The Material Politics Of Peripheral Making, Guilherme Meyer, Seher Mirza, Raees Calafato

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Dominant paradigms have confined imaginaries to narrow, hegemonic narratives, severing them from plural, relational, and non-domesticated possibilities. This paper challenges monolithic views of language and material craft by offering a transformative lens on cultural and linguistic dynamism within design research and practice. Drawing on “savage” futures (Lévi-Strauss, 1966) and “translanguaging” (Lee, 2015; García & Kleifgen, 2020), we highlight the situated creative practices of peripheral craft makers as mediums for multilingual storytelling, identity negotiation, and speculative futures. Translanguaging extends beyond language, involving embodied, material, and affective communication as non-hierarchical resources for collective worlding and shared meaning-making. Through participatory craft projects in …

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