Design Expo 2015

In 2014, the World Health Organization radically revised their definition of disability. The crux of this change was to define disability as context dependent rather than as an attribute of a person. Interactions with technology are a clear example of this shift. Design solutions can create new access and new barriers for people participating in society. How can we design to embrace these universal things that make us human, but also create solutions that are highly adaptive to an individual person?

Come see student presentations responding to this challenge on Inclusive Design & Technologies at the Microsoft Design Expo! Winners at top design schools from around the world will give 10-minute presentations on their projects. This year’s projects are: – Adaptool: Attachment base and tools to help people with loss of partial limbs to be more autonomous and increase their employability – New York University Shanghai, China – Fuzzy Bird: Interactive toy for children with autism that helps improve their social skills and encourages them to be more explorative in free play – Delft University of Technology, Netherlands – Gather Well: Creating shared knowledge for patients with hearing disabilities and family members after a medical appointment – Carnegie Mellon University, USA – Loom: Sharing stories and keeping memories between the physical and digital world as well as generations – University of Washington, USA – Mesh: A system that allows the user to register, share and relive memories bound to physical locations – Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – Seams & Superpowers: How ecologies formed by wearables and the Internet of Things create superpowers for people, overcoming their contextual and temporary disabilities – Art Center College of Design, USA – Sparkle!: Service & wearable device designed to help blind shoppers buy clothes – Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), South Korea – Tracktile: Electronically augmented, custom-made tactlile maps which allow their users to familiarize themselves with unknown surroundings in advance – University of Potsdam, Germany