Institute for Human Centered Design

Join us for a compelling conversation on fatphobia and size inclusivity with two acclaimed authors. Feminist philosopher Kate Manne and entrepreneur and advocate Joan Denizot. RSVP on Eventbrite using the link in our bio to get access to the Zoom link.

Joan Denizot, author of Big Body Business, challenges industries to be more inclusive. As the founder of ZIZE Bikes and BodyReady, she has dedicated her career to creating products, spaces, and business strategies that empower people of all sizes. She will discuss the economic and ethical opportunities of size inclusivity and the importance of challenging narratives around fatphobia and success.

In her latest book, Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia, Kate Manne explores fatphobia as a systemic form of oppression and how it intersects with all the other habits of ‘othering’ people. She discusses the real-world harms of fatphobia and how we can combat it by reshaping our world to accommodate people of any size.

Together, Manne and Denizot will discuss:
- Understanding fatphobia and how it functions as systemic oppression
- Ways fatphobia impacts everyday life
- How businesses and industries can actively include and support people of any size
- Practical steps to design society to anticipate and design in big people

Join us on Wednesday, January 15th for a webinar on universal design in the Nordic region with Camilla Ryhl! RSVP through Eventbrite using the link in our bio for access to the Zoom link. Please email us at [email protected] with any questions or concerns.

Universal design is the prevalent concept used in the Nordic Region, but it is interpreted differently in different architectural practices. In her new book Universal Design in architecture, Ryhl engages in a dialogue with 10 Danish and Norwegian architects about their understanding of universal design and sensory qualities of architecture. The talk will present findings through Nordic architecture cases as well as examples of how sensory experiences can be implemented and strengthened through the use of universal design.  

Camilla Ryhl is Research Director at the Bevica Foundation and Head of Universal Design Hub in Copenhagen, Denmark. 

She holds a Master’s and a Ph.D. degree in Architecture from the Royal Academy in Copenhagen. She has specialized in universal design and sensory qualities of architecture, as well as interpretation and implementation of universal design as a multidisciplinary principle. She has 20+ years’ experience as a researcher and a teacher, e.g. as Head of the universal design research group at BUILD AAU in Copenhagen, as Ed Roberts Post Doc Scholar at UC Berkeley, where she was also a Fulbright Scholar and as Professor in Universal design at Bergen School of Architecture in Norway.

She is regarded as a leading Nordic expert in the field of universal design.

December 3rd is the International Day of Persons with Disabilities.

This United Nations tradition began in 1992. It intends to raise awareness and promote the rights and perspectives of persons with disabilities around the world. People with disabilities are one in every six people in the world, 1.3 billion.

In the United States, it is more than one in four adults with a disability, 28.7%, about 71 million people.

At a time when armed conflict and climate change are putting lives around the world at risk, people with disabilities are the likeliest to suffer harm not only from actual injury but from the loss of critical infrastructure of ordinary environments like streets and sidewalks and specialized environments that support people to live the lives they choose. And conflict and climate change also create disabilities for children and adults.

Join us in making Inclusive Design in physical, information, communication, policy and attitudinal environments a core civil and human right. It’s time for a sense of urgency.

Join us on Tuesday, October 15 at 12pm EST for a webinar with Dr. Sally Augustin! RSVP on Eventbrite with the link in our bio for the Zoom link. Please email [email protected] with any questions or concerns.

Neuroscience research makes it clear: space design can make it more likely that people will think creatively. Now, when one of the prime reasons to return to the office is to generate creative solutions to the challenging problems organizations face, it’s particularly important to put to work what neuroscientists have learned about designing to nurture creativity. How can color, lighting, aesthetics, art, surface materials, furniture, soundscapes, indoor plants, nonverbal messaging, floorplanning, and architecture, for example, be used to encourage creative thinking? How can these design elements, and others, reinforce each other and simultaneously spur creativity? Designers can immediately use the information presented to develop environments that foster creative thinking/problem-solving.

Sally Augustin, PhD, is a practicing environmental psychologist, a principal at Design With Science, and a founder of The Space Doctors. She has extensive experience integrating neuroscience-based insights to develop recommendations for the design of places, objects, and services that support desired cognitive, emotional, and physical outcomes/experiences. Her client base is worldwide and includes organizations and individuals that produce and/or use designed solutions.