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More Than Concrete: The Tacit Knowledge Of Construction Workers Through Material Cognition And Embodied Experiences, Enza Migliore, Mirna Zordan, Peiyue Lin Jun 2026

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 …

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Three-Eyed Seeing: A Framework For Regenerative Ecological Design, Korey Wetherell, Chris Speed, Laura Albareda Jun 2026

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 …

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Playing Future Places Together, Troy Innocent, Carolyn Briggs, Ashleigh Dharma, Carlo Tolentino Jun 2026

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 …

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The Black Box In Spatial Planning: Visualizations Of Indeterminacy In Cybernetics And Model Theory, Marlon J. Brownsword, Adam Jasper, Christiane M. Herr, Thomas Fischer Jun 2026

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 …

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Shifting From Creativity To Sympoiesis: A Site-Oriented Design Inquiry Of More-Than-Human Creative Ai, Petra Jääskeläinen, Lisa Boulton, Ron Wakkary, Gillian Russell Jun 2026

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, Tavs Jorgensen, James Burch, Nina Shoulder, Toni Amato Jun 2026

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 …

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How Sound Knowledge And Education Can Support Designers In Creating Museum Experiences: Insights From Semi-Structured Interviews With Experts In Acoustics/Sound, Yi Zhang Jun 2026

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. …

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Decolonizing Care In Design Research: Familiness And Relational Practices From Creative Ageing In Thailand, Khemmiga Teerapong, Boonanan Natakun Jun 2026

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 …

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Participatory Design As An Epistemic Practice: Designing For Institutional Responsiveness In The Scottish Parliament, Cara Broadley Jun 2026

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 …

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Accessibility Analysis Of Hospital Lobbies In Korean Tertiary Hospitals Based On Space Syntax To Inform Design Strategies, Aijing Li, Yun Jeong Choi, Hokyun Lim Jun 2026

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 …

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Exploring How Packaging Transparency And Processing Level Affect Acceptance Of Edible Insects In Taiwan, Wei-Chen Chiu, Chun-Heng Ho Jun 2026

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 …

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Dialoguing With Design: How Llms Mediate Multimodal Workflows In Zero-Waste Fashion, Ping Li, Sarah Kettley, Mal James, Niki Taylor Jun 2026

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 …

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Dwelling, Making, And Digital Mediation: Mani Stone Piles In Eastern Tibet, Danmeng Xu, Han Sun, Zhijun Peng, Deng Pan, Jing Su Jun 2026

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 …

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Belonging Across Borders: A Framework For Transnationally Resonant Retail Design, Zakkiya Khan Jun 2026

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 …

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Heterodox Economic Perspective For Designing Sustainability Transitions: Integrating Fundamental Human Needs And The Milieu Approach, Maxime Ritouet, Audrey Tanguy, Tatiana Reyes, Valérie Laforest Jun 2026

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 …

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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 Jun 2026

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 …

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Toward Speculation Otherwise: Correspondence And Contamination In Design Engagements With Urban Renewal, Anna-Mamusu Sesay Wehlitz, Thomas Binder Jun 2026

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 …

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Materialising Ecologies Of Intelligence: Learning To Design With And Within More-Than-Human Systems, Marianne Mcara, Zoë Prosser, Kirsty Ross Jun 2026

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 …

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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 Jun 2026

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 …

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Mediating More-Than-Human Care: Art, Design And Climate Governance, Liesbeth Huybrechts, Jaz Hee-Jeong Choi, Rachel Elisabeth Clarke, Louise Mazet, Kana Ohashi Jun 2026

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 …

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The Role Of Packaging In Smart Home Design, Nour Al Maalouf, Chaiwoo Lee Jun 2026

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 …

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Ikigai: Co-Reflection With Ai To Enhance Career Direction Clarity In Design Education, Claudia Mayer, Wina Smeenk, Giulia Calabretta Jun 2026

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 …

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Putting An Ear To The Ground: Attending To Frictions In Human-Machine-Soil Temporalities, Margrete Lodahl Rolighed, Lone Koefoed Hansen Jun 2026

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 …

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(Re)Framing Timber Values: Cascade Use Metrics As A Dynamic Policy Tool, Elif Erez-Henderson, Nadja Gaudillière-Jami, Charlotte Malterre-Barthes Jun 2026

(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 …

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Tagus Estuary Color Swatch – Materials As Affective Mediators In More-Than-Human Temporalities, Mariana Simoes, Mariana Pestana, Frederico Duarte, Valentina Nisi Jun 2026

Tagus Estuary Color Swatch – Materials As Affective Mediators In More-Than-Human Temporalities, Mariana Simoes, Mariana Pestana, Frederico Duarte, Valentina Nisi

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper reimagines material catalogues not as static inventories but as archives of deep-time and affect: tools for sensing, caring for, and reconfiguring our relationships with the more-than-human world. It presents Tagus estuary colour swatch, a Research-through-Design exploration in which bio-pigments derived from local plant, mineral, algal, and waste streams form a colour palette embodying the estuary’s ecological rhythms. The project reframes materials beyond inert resources but rather as affective mediators of and for more-than-human temporalities – by embodying and expressing temporal processes and by enabling designers and audiences to engage with them. Positioned against the extractivist legacy of traditional …

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Design Activism Pedagogy: Learning And Negotiating Values In Practice, Gheysa Caroline Prado Jun 2026

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 …

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"It's Going To Be A Really Good Place To Hang Out": Supporting Diversity In Community Indoor Environments By Eliciting Autistic Adults’ Preferences, Asako Osedo, Stella Boess Jun 2026

"It's Going To Be A Really Good Place To Hang Out": Supporting Diversity In Community Indoor Environments By Eliciting Autistic Adults’ Preferences, Asako Osedo, Stella Boess

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This study investigates how indoor environments, for example of schools or workplaces, can actively support the diversity of communities, by considering the case of autistic adults’ preferences for them. Employing a participatory design approach, we engaged autistic individuals to understand their lived experiences, preferences for meaningful in-person social interactions, and their strategies to engage in social settings. Key findings highlight the importance of sensory regulation, vibrant and engaging spaces that mitigate awkwardness and promote authentic interactions, and the role of predictability and autonomy in reducing unnecessary stresses. We show how autistic adults can be supported in managing their regulation to …

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Grounding Artificial Intelligence: Terrestrial Cartography And Rare Earths In Chile, Martín Tironi, Manuela Garretón Jun 2026

Grounding Artificial Intelligence: Terrestrial Cartography And Rare Earths In Chile, Martín Tironi, Manuela Garretón

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This article argues for planetarizing artificial intelligence (AI) by re-situating its development within the terrestrial ecologies that sustain it. While dominant imaginaries frame AI as an immaterial and global technology, its infrastructures depend on geological, energetic, and social processes rooted in specific territories. Drawing on fieldwork in Penco, southern Chile—where a rare-earth mining project has sparked a complex socio-environmental controversy—we present Bajo nuestros pies, a research-creation project that develops a terrestrial cartography of AI. We propose two core operations for grounding AI: diplomacy, understood as cultivating sensitive encounters between heterogeneous temporalities and more-than-human agencies; and relationality, which interweaves geological, industrial, …

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Learnings From Peruvian Gastronomy For The Transculturalization Of Design Practices, Laura Salcedo Miranda, Juan Montalván Lume Jun 2026

Learnings From Peruvian Gastronomy For The Transculturalization Of Design Practices, Laura Salcedo Miranda, Juan Montalván Lume

DRS Biennial Conference Series

In recent decades, Peruvian gastronomy has experienced a higher exposure and production of culinary creations manifesting practices of transcultural mixture entangling diverse cultural influences. Nevertheless, there still remains a need for studies that discuss such cultural amalgamations, which could also inform strategies for transculturalization in other culturally sensitive practices like design. This paper analyses multiple variations of well-known Peruvian dishes to understand the historical and contemporary processes of cultural mixture that have fostered the current landscape. For this, a conceptual framework that draws from Latin American Transcultural Design Studies and Gastronomic Theory is proposed to enable transdisciplinary learnings entangling both …

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Toward A Culturally Situated Perspective: Rethinking The Role Of Ai In Intangible Cultural Heritage Pattern Creation, Xiaojing Yuan, Xiang Yuan, Sanyi Wang, Hao Li, Mengzhi He, Duoduo Zhang, Nick Bryan-Kinns Jun 2026

Toward A Culturally Situated Perspective: Rethinking The Role Of Ai In Intangible Cultural Heritage Pattern Creation, Xiaojing Yuan, Xiang Yuan, Sanyi Wang, Hao Li, Mengzhi He, Duoduo Zhang, Nick Bryan-Kinns

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Research on generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in cultural design has primarily focused on generative control and creative efficiency, often overlooking the misalignment between AI task definition and cultural creation. This study explores how GenAI can be culturally adapted within traditional pattern-making practices. Using an ethnographically informed generative probe, field experiments were conducted in the Huayao cross-stitch community, which practices a form of Chinese intangible cultural heritage. The findings reveal how cultural practitioners negotiate creative logic and cultural judgment when collaborating with AI, identifying four key orientations: liveliness, locality, creation-in-progress, and community creativity. Building on these insights, the paper redefines AI’s …

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