Reflections on DESIGN DIS(ABILITY)

April 04, 2015

This past week, I was fortunate to have been part of DESIGN (DIS)ABILITY, a program focused on the design and development of fashionable, desirable, accessible, functional clothing for people with disabilities. Over five days in Ljubljana, Slovenia, eight workshop participants worked in three teams to create 1) a jacket and pants that are much easier to put on with limited fine motor skills; 2) a better ankle-foot orthosis that is both more functional and more beautiful; and 3) a stylish jacket with an integrated heating system to provide additional warmth. The workshop was preceded by a month-long online component featuring lectures, meetings, and discussions among the workshop's organizers, participants, mentors, and users.

First and foremost, I'm truly thankful to the organizations behind DESIGN (DIS)ABILITY, Open Style Lab and RogLab, for including me as a mentor in the workshop. I've written about Open Style Lab before; I'm continually inspired by the accomplishments and leadership of its co-founder and executive, Grace Teo, and her team, from bringing a rain jacket for wheelchair users to market to offering an extensive, summer-long education program that brings together designers, engineers, and occupational therapists to create accessible clothing for people with disabilities. RogLab and its team, led by Meta Stular, meanwhile, was an extraordinary host. Part community makerspace, part makers of culture, and part facilitators of multidisciplinary collaborations, I was most impressed by the combination of thoughtfulness and pragmatism of this workshop. Thank you, Grace and Meta.

I was struck by the depth and passion of the conversations among the participants (Maia, Hedvig, Dejan, Magdalena, Levi, Petja, Evrim, Jensin) about design, disability, fashion, and accessibility that I had the chance to contribute to or overhear. These discussions, took place during the design process, during breaks and over breakfast and lunch, sometimes late into the night, and during other interstitial moments that only happen in an in-person event like this one. I think that the diversity of disciplines and international backgrounds of the participants contributed further to the complexity and nuance of these discussions. The workshop renewed my interest in international exchange and cross-cultural communication; thanks to the organizers, along with a number of local Slovenian participants, working on assistive technology in a new context and country worked remarkably well. I myself am writing this post on the plane returning back to Boston from Ljubljana -- I had the chance to spend time today, decompressing from the workshop, with Grace, Meta, and Tea, and our wide-ranging reflections have left me even fuller with thoughts.

Second, the skills and drive of the participants were amazing; I am floored by the caliber of the functional products that the three teams designed and built within just five days. Open Style Lab and RogLab assembled eight highly talented fashion designers, industrial designers, product designers, and engineers, some of whom have years of industry experience. They approached their projects with energy and vigor, iterating through multiple prototypes in daily testing sessions with the users and being persistent until problems were solved. To me, the most profound thing about all of this is that the participants weren't driven by charity or service; rather, they really wanted to succeed, and they brought the full strength of their professional skills and experience as designers and engineers to solve the challenge. Both in teaching and in my own experiences working in assistive technology, I've seen how powerful this match between one's skills and a meaningful project can be. In my view, it's one of the ways to sustain and grow interest in this area.

Finally, I think that the awareness and community built by the workshop will be one of its biggest impacts. There's arguably no better way to get to know, and learn from, other people than by collaborating with them:

Perhaps there should be more events/conferences where, instead of discussing completed work, participants work together on new projects.

— William Li (@williampli) March 31, 2015

This week, among many other things, I learned about fashion design, 3D printing and other rapid fabrication methods, sewing and stitching, Arduinos and electronics, making orthoses, and running an international workshop focused on design and disability; I think that both doing and talking made this possible.

Thank you again to everyone who contributed to the experience; I hope you got as much out of it as I did.

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Tags: assistive technology