I’ve been working with invisible forces recently.
Well, not really. But I have had the opportunity to work on a handful of projects exploring the power and significance of design. While planning, researching, and writing content for this year’s Dundee Design Festival, it occurred to me that although design is all around us, it’s not something we’re actively aware of. For instance, the chair you’re sitting on, the device you’re using, and even the website you’re reading were all designed (the latter by the brilliant Leah Moss), but it’s unlikely you’ve ever stopped to seriously consider the creative process behind any of these objects.
The fact we’re unaware of design is deliberate: good design is unobtrusive and slots seamlessly into our lives. It helps us navigate the physical and digital world in smoother ways. It simplifies working processes and makes entertainment easier to engage with. Impactful design can convince us to buy products or to follow brands. It even has the power to shape society and influence our behaviour.
Often, when we think about design, we think about style when really, it’s about solutions.
New designs are typically a direct response to our needs, but since we’re all unique beings, not all of our needs are the same. I have recently worked with a media production company to develop and written accessible design guidelines for their creative projects. As I delved deeper into research, it became clear that we tend to consider our own lived experiences first when working on new ideas, centring our individual needs. But this can exclude large portions of society whose needs aren’t taken into account. Combining this with my experiences within Dundee Design Festival’s content creation team, it became clear that designing inclusively really does make life easier for everyone. Many of the inventions we take for granted today were created with specific requirements at the fore.
Kerb cuts, the dipped wedges in an elevated street edge, were first introduced in Michigan in 1945 to make public streets accessible to wheelchair users, thanks to disability rights activist Ed Roberts. Introducing these dips offered wheelchair users independence while increasing their safety. These little dips in the pavement proved to be beneficial to everyone, from parents pushing prams to travellers wheeling baggage to people with impaired mobility—including folks who might be stumbling home after a few too many after a night out. (You can read Ed Robert’s full story at DDF’s Digital Design House.)
The widespread positive impact of these kerb cuts sparked innovation within the post-war design community. As part of the kerb cut effect, people realised that “assistive technology” could simply be normal design methods.
Here’s another example: have you ever tried to watch the TV in a noisy airport? We rely on closed captions to understand what’s being said because our hearing is limited. Closed captions were originally designed to help deaf people understand film and TV without needing to hear the dialogue or sound effects. Or perhaps your phone screen has automatically adjusted to the light when you’ve moved from inside to outside? Adaptive brightness was originally developed to benefit users with low or sensitive vision.
Inclusive design isn’t a modern idea. It has naturally developed and benefitted the masses throughout history. The original typewriter, for example, was invented by Countess Carolina Fantoni da Fivizzano and Pellegrino Turri in the early 1800s. The friends wrote to each other regularly, sparking rumours that they were in fact lovers. When the countess began to lose her vision, her only option at the time would have been to dictate her messages to a transcriber. To keep their letters private, the pair invented a machine that could write notes by pressing a key for a single letter, stamping it onto carbon paper. This invention not only allowed people who were blind the freedom to write independently but also acted as the base model for keyboards we all use today.
Everything we use and interact with daily was designed to help us move through the world, from traffic signals to pencils, road markings to the pavements we walk down. They’re only strengthened if we step back to look at the fullest picture possible and ensure every person has the opportunity to fully engage with our creations.
The results of innovative design are all around us. Take a closer look at the objects in your home workplace, and town or city. There are hidden stories there, waiting to be discovered. It’s all deliberate, by design.
Dundee Design Festival is now live and runs from 23 September 2021 - 3 October 2021, with five design houses in Dundee and Online. Find out more here.