Designing for the 21st Century III

7 – 12 December, 2004, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Mike Westley (Programs and Design)

The lead sponsor and organiser of the event was Adaptive Environments, a 25 year old non-profit organisation based in Boston, USA, working to promote human centred design both in the USA and internationally. The host sponsorship was provided by Centro de Vida Independente do Rio de Janeiro, the first independent living centre in Brazil.

This conference brought together an international gathering of people from the world of inclusive (or universal) design. Within this overall theme the conference provided the opportunity for the exchange of ideas and experience about the design of places, products, information, policies and programs that (as the program guide noted) “demonstrate the power of design to shape a 21st century world that works for all of us”.

The conference organisers were careful to achieve a balance of grass roots activity between a wide range of designers, researchers and practitioners and a powerful selection of influential, international bodies and NGO’s involved in legislation, regulation, funding and development.

This inclusive design focus was particularly relevant to present-day Brazil where President Lula has recently developed new initiatives on inclusive technology. In addition, the city of Curitiba has demonstrated an internationally acclaimed example of urban planning and transportation which fundamentally addresses both sustainability and inclusion.

Underlying the main conference focus was the theme of sustainability, picking up on the world symposium on sustainable development held in the same city in the 1990’s. All presenters and participants were asked to reflect on the implications of what they experienced from the wider social and environmental contexts. The concern with sustainability was one of the main reasons for the choice of Brazil to host the event, since the intention was to act as a catalyst for building understanding and collaboration between the developed and developing nations.

Besides the conference presentations themselves, the event contained a variety of different activities, which helped to promote the idea of collaborative, creative idea exchange.

The City of Rio de Janeiro worked with event partners to host a series of design case studies addressing issues of public access around the city itself. Pre-conference intensive sessions gave participants the opportunity to focus at length on their own special interests with an international range of similar projects. Looking to the future, as part of its outreach and dissemination objectives, the conference hosted an inclusive design competition which received submissions from over 500 design schools, worldwide.

The Sensory Trust contributed as a member of the conference planning committee and presented a core conference session entitled ‘Making Sense’, presented by Michael Westley, Programme Manager. The session used Sensory Trust project case studies to explore techniques developed to help local communities, including people with disabilities, contribute inclusively to the design and management of their local greenspace resources.

The case studies involved both urban and rural locations and a range of techniques or ‘tools’ drawn from the Trust's own Inclusive Evaluation Toolbox. As part of the session Michael involved participants in a taster session of some of the tools.

The feedback obtained from session participants demonstrated that the inclusive principles of the Trust’s work and the techniques being developed were welcomed by projects tackling access issues in a number of different contexts; from public greenspace to schools, museums, hospitals and residential communities and urban designers.

More information www.designfor21st.org.

| Latest Newsletter | Articles A-Z | Articles by subject |