Designing in the absence of sight: Design cognition re-articulated

Abstract

Starting from the study of an architect who designs in the absence of sight, we question to what extent prevailing notions of design may be complemented with alternative articulations. In doing so, we point at the cognitivist understanding of human cognition underlying design researchers' outspoken attention for 'visual thinking', and contrast this with more situated understandings of human cognition. The ontological and epistemological differences between both raise questions about how design research is produced, and consequently what design can also be. By accounting for how a blind architect re-articulates prevailing notions of design, we invite researchers to keep the discussion open and call for an ontological and epistemological re-articulation in design research.

Universal design and the challenge of diversity: reflections on the principles of UD, based on empirical research of people’s mobility

“…Rather than thinking about the reduction of diversity through the unity of the universal, it should reflect on ways of drawing on it in order to design a plural environment endowed with varied resources and characteristics that respond to and encourage the diversity of ways of taking action that people put in place. With this conclusion, I agree with the analysis by Heylighen [43,44] and her team (AIDA project) that has shown that consideration by architects of different types of impairments leads them to think differently about space, to give it additional qualities, and to redefine its frontiers. This enrichment of our environment could, in turn, create new abilities for everyone, transform the experience and sensitivity of each unique entity, engender an even larger variety of abilities, perceptions, experiences, etc.…”

Turning disability experience into expertise in assessing building accessibility: A contribution to articulating disability epistemology

“…As part of an ongoing transdisciplinary research project exploring dialogues between disability and architectural design (Nijs, Vermeersch, Devlieger, & Heylighen, 2010;Vermeersch, Nijs, & Heylighen, 2011;Heylighen & Nijs, 2014), we conducted a longer-term ethnographic study of the AAC's practices. This article describes and analyses a subset of the gathered ethnographic material.…”

Capturing architects’ designerly ways of knowing about users: Exploring an ethnographic research approach

“…Nowadays, designing is increasingly understood as situated in and distributed across a sociomaterial environment (Heylighen and Nijs 2014). Design is rather a team than an individual activity (Valkenburg and Dorst 1998).…”

“…As these rely on self-reporting, they risk a diverted presentation of the design process (Lawson 1994, p.2), and provide little insight into how knowledge about users is embedded in architects' design practice. This paper starts from an understanding of design as a process situated in and distributed across a socio-material environment (Heylighen and Nijs 2014). Acknowledging the mediating role of different stakeholders and design materials implies that they should be taken into account when studying architects' designerly ways of knowing about users.…”