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Articles 481 - 510 of 36539

Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities

Extending Futures Literacy To Speech Scientists And Technologists, Sjuul Bos, Simone Ashby, Julian Hanna Jun 2026

Extending Futures Literacy To Speech Scientists And Technologists, Sjuul Bos, Simone Ashby, Julian Hanna

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As speech technologies make rapid strides, facilitating multi-tasking, workflow automation, and cross-cultural collaboration, attention to the adverse effects of such technologies (e.g., legacy bias and inequities) continues to lag, exposing the need for non-designers, such as speech scientists and technologists, to critically assess the ethical implications of their work. In this paper, we present the art-based futuring methods used in a speech technology summer school we co-organized for guiding students in exploring the unintended consequences of speech technology outputs. By sharing our methods and pedagogical insights, we aim to help educators promote discussions on themes like fairness and inclusivity and …

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Transitional Materials And Collaborative Craft: European–Indonesian Design Practices From The Design Matters Lab Programme Toward A Resilient Future, Xingyu Tao, Samantha Vettese Jun 2026

Transitional Materials And Collaborative Craft: European–Indonesian Design Practices From The Design Matters Lab Programme Toward A Resilient Future, Xingyu Tao, Samantha Vettese

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Design Matters Lab (DML) was a collaborative design programme that brought together ten emerging designers from Europe and Indonesia for an online and in-person design residency in Bandung, Indonesia. This paper explores the concepts, methods, and outcomes of DML, offering a potential blueprint for small-sized international businesses seeking to integrate crafting techniques and local, sustainable materials into their manufacturing processes. The project also proposes a methodology for teaching sustainability in design through meaningful environmental engagement rooted in local collaboration and applied practice. It emphasises the importance of working with local communities and using locally available waste and bio- materials. The …

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Cuia Colab: Toward A Design Across Species, Worlds And Relations, Andrea Bandoni Jun 2026

Cuia Colab: Toward A Design Across Species, Worlds And Relations, Andrea Bandoni

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Cuia Colab emerged from a design research project seeking to explore whether biodesign practices in the Amazon could foster equitable exchanges between traditional knowledge and contemporary design. The research combined theoretical and empirical methods, beginning with a literature review and a case study focused on the cuias of Santarém. Subsequent stages involved active field investigation through observation, collaboration with traditional cuia artisans, biodesign experiments integrating living organisms, and a co-created exhibition. Grounded in a situated, multispecies, and pluriversal approach, Cuia Colab revealed both the challenges and possibilities of establishing ethical and reciprocal relations between design and the Amazonian context. The …

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The Paradox Of Richness: A Discourse-Centered Framework For Equitable Visualization, Fangbo Wu, Canyu Jiang, Yanlin Yin, Yonghong Liu Jun 2026

The Paradox Of Richness: A Discourse-Centered Framework For Equitable Visualization, Fangbo Wu, Canyu Jiang, Yanlin Yin, Yonghong Liu

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The proliferation of new technologies, notably GenAI, alongside augmented and virtual reality, has produced a paradoxical situation in visualization practice: while offering unprecedented multimodal richness, their complexity erects new barriers to entry, thereby exacerbating inequality and undermining design's democratic promise. Although research at the micro-level of visualization techniques abounds, a critical and systematic methodology for addressing the inherent power dynamics and design justice issues from meso- and macro-perspectives remains conspicuously absent. This paper intervenes by adapting an analytical framework from Critical Discourse Analysis to embed design justice within visualization practice. We propose a four-layer framework—Culture, Context, Meaning, and Expression (CCME)—as …

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Care-Full Systems: Applying Tronto’S Ethics Of Care Into Systemic Design Processes, Maud Gruyters, Kaat Kenis, Ivo Dewit, Alexis Jacoby Jun 2026

Care-Full Systems: Applying Tronto’S Ethics Of Care Into Systemic Design Processes, Maud Gruyters, Kaat Kenis, Ivo Dewit, Alexis Jacoby

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper explores how care ethics, particularly Joan Tronto’s five dimensions of care, can enrich systemic design practices by embedding ethical and political reflections into co-design processes. The paper uses Tronto's framework as an ethical guide through the systemic design methodology of Jones and Van Ael and a retrospective case study involving children with incarcerated parents. It highlights how care ethics can guide designers in navigating complex relational dynamics, redistributing power, and fostering trust and responsiveness in co-creative processes. The study emphasizes the importance of designer positionality, expectation management, and co-ownership, especially when working with vulnerable groups. Ultimately, it proposes …

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Scaffolding Oceans Futures: Design For Embedded, Embodied, And Emergent Thinking, Gillian Russell, Katherine Reilly, Jihyun Park, Lauren Thu Jun 2026

Scaffolding Oceans Futures: Design For Embedded, Embodied, And Emergent Thinking, Gillian Russell, Katherine Reilly, Jihyun Park, Lauren Thu

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Citizen science and citizen data are widely used to engage with anthropogenic effects such as pollution and species loss. However, their focus on data gathering and objectivization can result in dispassionate learning. Futures scaffolding offers an alternative design approach that reimagines how environmental knowledge can be generated, experienced, and materialized. Positioned within co-speculative design, this practice uses design methods to make visible what data represents and to cultivate ocean futures. This paper mobilizes a workshop kit called Monsters of Marine Debris (MMD) as an object of design to illustrate futures scaffolding. MMD makes data a source of futures-making rather than …

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Becoming Designers: Studio Instructors As Catalysts Of Designerly Identity Formation, Beril Gök Jun 2026

Becoming Designers: Studio Instructors As Catalysts Of Designerly Identity Formation, Beril Gök

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Embodiment, affect, and symbolic modelling remain underexplored dimensions of designerly identity formation, despite its recognition as a central outcome of design education. While existing research emphasizes cognitive-skill acquisition, little is known about how studio instructors shape identity through aesthetic, relational, and performative means. This study examines the influence of instructors within the socio-aesthetic ecology of the design studio. Using abductive thematic analysis of focus group interviews with teaching assistants across architecture, industrial design, interior design, and fashion design, the study highlights shared cross-disciplinary patterns across international contexts. Findings reveal that instructors shape designerly becoming not only through teaching but also …

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Participatory Place-Shaping Through Collaborative Counterstorying, Danielle Lake, Sandy Marshall, Berenice Sanchez-Rosaldo, James Shields Jr. Jun 2026

Participatory Place-Shaping Through Collaborative Counterstorying, Danielle Lake, Sandy Marshall, Berenice Sanchez-Rosaldo, James Shields Jr.

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper examines how the Power+Place Collaborative — a participatory placeshaping design partnership — reflects, reinforces, and resists the dominant educational, political, and social systems it seeks to transform. Since 2018, the Collaborative has been working with historically and systematically marginalized communities to critically examine the power-laden place-design processes of a diverse, semi-urban county in the Southern United States. Through oral history interviews, digital and place-based storytelling, and community gatherings, the Collaborative aims to construct a more inclusive narrative of our county and cultivate opportunities for systemic transformation. Reflecting the call to consider the ethics of participation in systemic design, …

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Play And Pilina: Reimagining Play Design Through Material Kinship And Cultural Practice, Corinne Takara Jun 2026

Play And Pilina: Reimagining Play Design Through Material Kinship And Cultural Practice, Corinne Takara

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Playful encounters at the intersection of familiar consumer materials and place-based natural matter are fertile terrain for speculative play world-building. This paper introduces bio-collaborative play, a design paradigm where materials and organisms are recognized as active collaborators and kin. This shifts play design away from the manipulation of objects toward a sustained dialogue with living systems. Grounded in Kānaka ‘Ōiwi (Native Hawaiian) principles of pilina (reciprocal care) and kuleana (privileged responsibility), this framework reimagines speculative play as an act of communal care spanning biological scales and generational time. By treating plants, microbes, and everyday materials as co-authors, this approach analyzes …

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Cultivating Careful Design Responses To Homelessness Through Practice, Theory And Education, Jodi Sturge, Charlotte Persijn, Lynn Wens, Noor Fleerackers, Dotte Van Den Elshout, Stephanie C.J. Kohnle, Timon J.H. De Groot Jun 2026

Cultivating Careful Design Responses To Homelessness Through Practice, Theory And Education, Jodi Sturge, Charlotte Persijn, Lynn Wens, Noor Fleerackers, Dotte Van Den Elshout, Stephanie C.J. Kohnle, Timon J.H. De Groot

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Homelessness is a public health problem worldwide. System-wide failures often hinder solutions to this complex issue. In design and architecture education, the issue of homelessness is rarely brought into the curriculum. This paper describes how practice and theory related to homelessness can be applied to design education. First, a practice-based workshop was developed to enhance student reflexivity through exploring biases toward homelessness and applying trauma-informed theory to redesign products, services, and systems for homeless populations. Secondly, two case studies applied the theory deductively and critically reflected upon trauma-informed principles to housing and homeless design projects in hindsight and foresight. Our …

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Reimagining Materiality: Responsible And Experiential Vr Design For Fashion E-Commerce In India, Prajwala Dasari, Min-Ji Seo Jun 2026

Reimagining Materiality: Responsible And Experiential Vr Design For Fashion E-Commerce In India, Prajwala Dasari, Min-Ji Seo

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This research explores how fashion brands can replicate touch and garment materiality through digital design strategies to engage Gen Z shoppers in India, addressing the sensory absence in e-commerce. Using an interpretivist, qualitative, multi-method approach involving eight semi-structured interviews and five participant observations, the study investigates how Virtual Reality (VR) can enhance emotional engagement and responsible consumption in fashion retail. Guided by the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) and the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), findings show that gamification, interactivity, and personalisation—combined with transparency and brand trust—drive consumer acceptance. The study highlights the importance of inclusive and …

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We Found Planet B. What Does This Mean For Design?, Candela Guyot, Victoria Rodriguez Schon Jun 2026

We Found Planet B. What Does This Mean For Design?, Candela Guyot, Victoria Rodriguez Schon

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Planet B emerges as a practice-based-fiction responding ironically to the slogan “There is no Planet B.” The project speculates on the discovery of an alternate planet and the task of replicating Planet A under the principle “if it looks the same, it is the same.” Through absurd protocols for selecting the perfect rock, flower, and stick, the experience enacted a satire of technoscientific control. Developed within the School of Materialist Research’s exploration of Nature and Artifice, it asks: what sensory, political, and aesthetic implications would the discovery of a Planet B bring to the design practice? Children spontaneously took over …

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Reframing Design Through Events: Generative Events As Ontological Units In Object-Oriented Design Ontology, Fengjin Yu, Qiaozhi Zhao Jun 2026

Reframing Design Through Events: Generative Events As Ontological Units In Object-Oriented Design Ontology, Fengjin Yu, Qiaozhi Zhao

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This study confronts the theoretical challenges arising from the increasing practical overlap of Participatory Design (PD) and Co-Design. Existing research, largely confined to method comparisons, lacks an ontological perspective capable of explaining its underlying integrative mechanisms. To address this critical gap, this paper argues for a fundamental ontological shift. We introduce the concept of 'generative events' as the basic ontological unit of design, a concept constructed by synthesising Object-Oriented Design Ontology (OODO) with Process Ontology. This framework reframes design as a dynamic generative process where humans and non-human objects collaboratively construct relationships and meaning within specific contexts. The contribution of …

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From Commodity To Commons: Creating Local Eco-Systems For The Design Of Sustainable Nhs Garments In Scotland, Lewis Urquhart, Paul Rodgers, Niki Taylor, Euan Winton, Lucy Welsh, Sophia Murden Jun 2026

From Commodity To Commons: Creating Local Eco-Systems For The Design Of Sustainable Nhs Garments In Scotland, Lewis Urquhart, Paul Rodgers, Niki Taylor, Euan Winton, Lucy Welsh, Sophia Murden

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper investigates the transformation of NHS Scotland garment systems through a design-led, commons-based localist framework that challenges prevailing globalised procurement models. Drawing on co-design methodologies and sustainable material innovation, this project repositions garments - specifically surgical caps and scrubs - as relational artefacts embedded within systems of care, identity, and ecological responsibility. Collaborations with healthcare professionals, designers, and regional manufacturers have yielded prototypes utilising regenerative fibres such as lyocell and linen, made locally within Scotland. These interventions demonstrate the potential of commons-design to foster civic engagement, decentralised production, and circular economies. By embedding garment systems within local ecologies and …

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Minamata’S Ecological Encounters Codesheet: Designing Remembrance Lenses Through More-Than-Human And Media Archaeology, Lucas Ogasawara De Oliveira, Kouta Minamizawa Jun 2026

Minamata’S Ecological Encounters Codesheet: Designing Remembrance Lenses Through More-Than-Human And Media Archaeology, Lucas Ogasawara De Oliveira, Kouta Minamizawa

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Consumer media devices routinely expose humans and environments to sensing and data capture while obscuring their own operations, supply chains, and ecological impacts. This paper asks how such devices might instead support planetary awareness with care and transparency. Working with Minamata, Japan, as a paradigmatic case, we combine more-than-human design, media archaeology, and research-through-design evidence-based fieldwork to develop the Ecological Encounters Codesheet (EEC): a granular method for coding encounters across temporal strata, containment forms, risk regimes, opacity sources, and care practices. Applying the EEC to Minamata’s infrastructures, memorials, archives, and tourist ecologies, we derive a set of Remembrance Lenses that …

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Human-Centred Digital Twin Design For Elderly Care: Addressing Comorbidity And Wellbeing, Nan Sheng, Emmanuel Tskeleves, Paul Cureton, Qi Chen Jun 2026

Human-Centred Digital Twin Design For Elderly Care: Addressing Comorbidity And Wellbeing, Nan Sheng, Emmanuel Tskeleves, Paul Cureton, Qi Chen

DRS Biennial Conference Series

China's rapidly ageing urban population faces complex mental health challenges, particularly with comorbid conditions. Current elderly care is nonpersonalised and unresponsive to support holistic wellbeing. To address the challenges of inclusive, responsive, and adaptable senior care, this study suggests a human-centred digital twin framework that incorporates service ecosystem design. This study employs a human-centred digital twin design methodology based on service ecosystem theory, focusing on how digital twins can mediate between users’ lived experiences and service innovation. The findings from the literature review and design practice indicate that digital twin technology has potential foster older adults’ life experience, social inclusion, …

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Redefining Design Practice As A Sensory And Decentred Experience, Azeem Hamid, Umar Hameed, Kristi Kuusk, Nithikul Nimkulrat Jun 2026

Redefining Design Practice As A Sensory And Decentred Experience, Azeem Hamid, Umar Hameed, Kristi Kuusk, Nithikul Nimkulrat

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper examines how sensory focused practice can decentre the role of the design educator-researcher within design education, reframing learning as a relational and embodied form of practice-led design research. Drawing on a sensory workshop with foundation-year design students in Lahore, Pakistan, it explores how listening, movement, and tactile engagement foster reflective awareness and co-creation. Informed by theories of embodied cognition and relational pedagogy, the study considers how agency in learning environments extends beyond the educator to include materials, atmospheres, and collective experiences. Sensory practice is presented not as an adjunct to design but as integral to it, cultivating attentiveness, …

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Queer(Ing) Epistemology By Design: Tmi-Web—A Relational Knowledge System For Intersectional Data Science And Affective Queries, Jess Parris Westbrook, Coraline Ada Ehmke Jun 2026

Queer(Ing) Epistemology By Design: Tmi-Web—A Relational Knowledge System For Intersectional Data Science And Affective Queries, Jess Parris Westbrook, Coraline Ada Ehmke

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Queer(ing) is a practice of questioning, unsettling, and liberating that resists normative ways of knowing. This paper advances a Queer(ing) epistemology for intersectional data science and offers TMI (Too Much Information)-WEB as a working case. This open source, theory-driven qualitative data analysis ecosystem treats identity, lived experience, and power as relational, contextual, and co-constructed. Built on a human-centered graph data model, it reimagines databases as dynamic knowledge systems rather than neutral containers. Authentic, identity-driven personas emerge from participants’ own narratives, while affective queries invite researchers to explore (and experience) patterns of harm, coping, joy, and self-acceptance across intersectional lives and …

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Investigating The Embodied Aesthetics Of Kinetic Structures At Biennales And World Expos, Hatice Hilal Topuz, Güzin Şen Jun 2026

Investigating The Embodied Aesthetics Of Kinetic Structures At Biennales And World Expos, Hatice Hilal Topuz, Güzin Şen

DRS Biennial Conference Series

In biennales and world expos, where creative ideas, cultural values, and technological developments in art and architecture are exhibited, kinetic systems are increasingly used in installations and pavilions. This paper frames kinetic structures in relation to embodied aesthetics and investigates how such kinetic structures go beyond mere display to offer visitors a holistic aesthetic experience. It introduces a selection of kinetic structures presented in diverse biennales and expos by utilizing publications, commentaries, and curatorial statements; deconstructs and analyzes their designs regarding types of movement, body-space-time relations, participation modes, embodied metaphors, and conceptual narratives. Thus, the paper shows how kinetic structures …

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Images Of Humans In Public Sector Design, Mieke Van Der Bijl-Brouwer, Jennie Winhall Jun 2026

Images Of Humans In Public Sector Design, Mieke Van Der Bijl-Brouwer, Jennie Winhall

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Human-centred design is an essential element of the application of design in public and social sectors. What has remained largely unexpressed in the field is the way in which design is influenced by how we see humans, and how that is informed by our worldviews and dominant paradigms. In this conceptual paper, we investigate five common views on humans – user, worker, fallible individual, consumer, and whole and social being - based on four dimensions. The dimensions include 1) depth, 2) personal focus, 3) social focus, and 4) level of agency. Based on a case study of youth unemployment, we …

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The Ecology Of Effort: Aesthetics Of Resistance In The Age Of Frictionless Design, Stefano Caggiano Jun 2026

The Ecology Of Effort: Aesthetics Of Resistance In The Age Of Frictionless Design, Stefano Caggiano

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper examines how design can restore cognitive and sensory depth within a culture shaped by frictionless digitality. The dominance of frictionless design—defined by speed, ease, and seamlessness—has optimized usability but diminished the experiential conditions that make meaning possible. Meaning emerges through resistance: the effort, uncertainty, and interpretive engagement that activate attention and reward. Drawing on embodied cognition and semiotic theory, the paper argues that cognitive effort and sensory resistance are essential to perception and value. Physical and spatial artefacts, through material texture, spatial articulation, and perceptual complexity, can reintroduce friction into everyday experience, inviting interpretive participation rather than passive …

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Contextual Intelligence For Ai In Design: A Liberal Education Lens, Amit Kundal, Shamit Shrivastav, Tina Mangwani Jun 2026

Contextual Intelligence For Ai In Design: A Liberal Education Lens, Amit Kundal, Shamit Shrivastav, Tina Mangwani

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As Artificial Intelligence (AI) becomes embedded in design education and practice, global experts highlight a key challenge: preparing design students to engage with AI responsibly and contextually. This paper explores how liberal education’s interdisciplinary approach builds contextual understanding for designers to leverage AI tools effectively. ​​Informed by the philosophy of an Indian design school that is rooted in liberal education, along with insights from global design experts, the study introduces a conceptual model: CI-AID (Contextual Intelligence for AI in Design). CI-AID extends on the traditional double diamond, where interdisciplinary knowledge enables a comprehensive discovery of the context that the design …

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Designing Preparatory Haptics: Relational Timing And Bodily Anticipation In Industrial Driving Contexts, Zhe Dai, Yonghong Liu, Pingping Fang, Xiangtian Bai, Yifei Xue, Fan Wu, Qian Ou Jun 2026

Designing Preparatory Haptics: Relational Timing And Bodily Anticipation In Industrial Driving Contexts, Zhe Dai, Yonghong Liu, Pingping Fang, Xiangtian Bai, Yifei Xue, Fan Wu, Qian Ou

DRS Biennial Conference Series

In safety-critical industrial contexts, visual alerts often fail under high cognitive load. This paper introduces Preparatory Haptics, framing haptic timing as a relational medium that reshapes bodily anticipation. We developed a wearable haptic prototype synchronized with auditory cues to investigate how temporal coordination and vibration modes influence attention and readiness. A driving-simulation study showed that advance-timing haptic cues foster proactive anticipation, whereas sustained vibrations are perceived as bodily resonance rather than interference, particularly under complex task conditions. These findings ground the Preparatory Haptics Framework, which treats temporal materiality as a generative element of embodied interaction and offers theoretical and practical …

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Not Post-Digital But More-Than-Human: Rethinking Digital Design For Regional Natural History Museums, Katt Grover, Argenis Ramirez Gomez, Claire Bailey Ross Jun 2026

Not Post-Digital But More-Than-Human: Rethinking Digital Design For Regional Natural History Museums, Katt Grover, Argenis Ramirez Gomez, Claire Bailey Ross

DRS Biennial Conference Series

What if the future of digital design in museums isn’t found in cutting-edge institutions, but in the often-overlooked ecologies of regional natural history collections? This paper repositions small regional museums not as lagging behind in digital transformation, but as fertile grounds for exploring more-than-human digital design. Drawing on an ongoing collaborative project between the Portsmouth Natural History Museum and the University of Portsmouth, we reflect on the interactive experiences using low-cost holograms and motion-capture avatars as mediators between human and non-human actors within museum ecologies. Giving collections voices and personalities engaged audiences, yet in attempting to become more-than-human, the collections …

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Research Through Game Design, Oliver Bates, Ben Kirman, Marcia Tavares Smith, David Philip Green Jun 2026

Research Through Game Design, Oliver Bates, Ben Kirman, Marcia Tavares Smith, David Philip Green

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Games are common artefacts and systems for design research, appearing as engagement tools with publics or specific audiences, expressions of ideas, and as tools for speculation. Games have proven value as instruments or outputs supporting this work, but the process of designing games is rarely centered as a moment of production of new knowledge and understanding. Taking inspiration from Research through Design more broadly, we position Research through Game Design as an approach that delineates space to challenge systems, break from norms, provoke, critique, explore, experiment, critically design, and reflect on the frictions and boundaries of ideas, artefacts, and systems. …

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Cultureaction! An Interaction And Experience Design Project To Explore San Marino’S Historic Center As A Living Archive., Silvia Gasparotto Jun 2026

Cultureaction! An Interaction And Experience Design Project To Explore San Marino’S Historic Center As A Living Archive., Silvia Gasparotto

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This research explores how design-driven approaches can boost engagement with cultural heritage and archives, centering on an experimental initiative in San Marino's historic center. The project envisions the city as a dynamic archive brought to life through interactive installations. A system featuring an interactive device called Iride and six site-specific installations was created to reveal the hidden historical and meaningful layers within the urban landscape. These installations use multisensory components to craft experiences that enhance visitors' cognitive and emotional connections with local cultural stories. This method illustrates how design and digital technology can connect tangible and intangible heritage, institutional archives …

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Becoming A Coffee Shop Regular: Factors Shaping Regularity In Contemporary Coffee Shops, Mia B. Münster, Rebekah Matheny, Kirsten Marie Raahauge Jun 2026

Becoming A Coffee Shop Regular: Factors Shaping Regularity In Contemporary Coffee Shops, Mia B. Münster, Rebekah Matheny, Kirsten Marie Raahauge

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This study explores customers’ motivations to become regulars at contemporary specialty coffee shops and identifies the features that make these places meaningful enough for repeated visits. Drawing on observations and in situ interviews with staff and regular customers in Hong Kong, Copenhagen, and Columbus, the study examines how regular destinations emerge in contemporary café culture. The analysis identifies recurring characteristics of places that individuals consider their regular spots: (1) high-quality offerings, including quality products and professional service; (2) convenient and attractive locations; (3) the resources to accommodate different types of visits; (4) connectedness, or a sense of community and shared …

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Design As Interface: From Architectural Design To Circular Systems Design, Georgios Triantafyllidis, Lizhen Huang Jun 2026

Design As Interface: From Architectural Design To Circular Systems Design, Georgios Triantafyllidis, Lizhen Huang

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Circular economy planning for the built environment is a wicked problem: data are fragmented, tools are siloed, and the goals of material reuse are contested. Those aspects collectively contribute to generating systemic barriers towards circular economy transition. This study targets this challenge by proposing the Circular City Twin as a conceptual open system-of-systems that enables shared inquiry and collaborative action between city and building scales. Drawing on second-order cybernetics and meta-design principles, the Circular City Twin acts as an architectural interface: a modular, scalable, extensible digital infrastructure that integrates cadastral data, parametric BIM generation, and semantic models to deliver high-granularity …

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Neurodesign In Urban Environments: Fmri Insights For Designing Cognitively Supportive Cities, Saijal Sharma, Tian Cheng, Gerhard Bruyns Jun 2026

Neurodesign In Urban Environments: Fmri Insights For Designing Cognitively Supportive Cities, Saijal Sharma, Tian Cheng, Gerhard Bruyns

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Advances in neuroscience and neuroimaging have created new pathways to interpret how urban environments shape spatial cognition, psychological well-being, mobility, behaviour, and related outcomes across different age groups. This review examines the use of Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) in urban settings and assesses its contribution to an age-inclusive, longevity-focused environment. It synthesises interdisciplinary research into a concise framework that integrates fMRI-based pattern recognition with stimuli mapping to generate design insights. Within this context, fMRI is positioned as a complementary methodological approach to be used alongside ethnographic, participatory, and experiential methods in generating neuro-informed design knowledge. The review highlights design-relevant …

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Unwording Design: Demilitarizing The Imaginaries Of Design, Xaviera Sánchez De La Barquera Estrada, Sergio Dávila Urrutia Jun 2026

Unwording Design: Demilitarizing The Imaginaries Of Design, Xaviera Sánchez De La Barquera Estrada, Sergio Dávila Urrutia

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Design’s vocabulary is saturated with metaphors of control (targets, strategies, impacts), revealing a militarized ontology that frames design as domination over problems, contexts, and futures. This paper examines the politics of wording and introduces Unwording Design as a practice of ontological care: dismantling violent grammars that sustain extractive imaginaries and cultivating vocabularies grounded in affection, reciprocity, and relational ethics. Drawing on Haraway’s insight that the thoughts we use to think matter (2016), Butler’s performativity (2006), and Escobar’s ontological design (2018), we argue that transforming language transforms the worlds design brings into being. Unwording shifts from languages of war to languages …

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