One situation colours the next
Hi there đ I was presenting at a workshop on accessibility and universal design in museums. About twenty participants were in the room. I was in the middle of describing the entrance of the building where I had worked for years, the Ingvar Kamprad Design Centre in Lund, when one of the participants, a seasoned accessibility advisor, raised her hand.
I was talking about how the wheelchair sign on the door created a division between visitors, an example I had used in many presentations and in class with our design students.
She said, âBut is there really a sign on that door? I canât remember that?â
There I was, in my role as an expert on these issues, being called out for what turned out to be an imaginary sign that I was convinced was there.
I went back and photographed the entrance later that day. Revolving door on the left. Straight door on the right. No sign. And in the glass, my wheelchair, reflected back at me.
My perceptual system had learned this pattern so thoroughly: revolving door on the left, accessible door on the right, wheelchair sign pointing the way, that it supplied the missing piece automatically. My mind was doing exactly what minds do: recognising patterns from experiences accumulated over thirty-plus years of being categorised by wheelchair signs.
This is how categorisation [1] works: it is done to someone by someone else (see Nonclusive by Design #7). The wheelchair sign was there, present in my mind, as a residue from a string of situations where I had been labelled as a disabled person.
One situation colours the next [2]. Over time, these small signals accumulate. They shape how we approach the next entrance, the next situation, the next design.
What we design designs us back
The design theorist Anne-Marie Willis calls this ontological designing: "we design our world, while our world acts back on us and designs us." [3, p.80]. The wheelchair signs I had spent years critiquing had also been shaping me for decades.
I am used to access being conditional. Something to ask for, to negotiate, to conform with. To be disablised (#14).
The conditional access paradigm (#9) shapes not only the present situation but also how I approach the next one.
The irony here is that I actually prefer the building without the wheelchair sign. The absence of the sign was actually good Universal Design, an entrance that didn't need to mark or treat me as separate.
The question this piece is really asking is not just what wheelchair signs say about environments. It is what they do to the people who follow them. What they build, over thirty years, inside a person.
This is why lived experience matters. What had been designed into me, situation by situation over thirty years, was shaping what I could see. Sometimes it takes someone else to point out what you take for granted, such as that wheelchair sign, present everywhere, even where it is not.
Consider this, whether you design buildings, policy, or workshops: the people you are designing for carry their history. Someone using a wheelchair arriving at your entrance is not a blank slate encountering design totally fresh. They arrive through the perceptual and experiential structure that decades of design have built in them. Your design will be encountered through that structure, whether you account for it or not.
And what history do you bring to the table? What categorisations are you accustomed to, and how will they affect what you create? How is your work designing the people who use it?
One situation colours the next. Over time, what we design designs us back.
Your turn
Have you ever reached for a handle that wasn't there, or looked for a sign that your mind insisted existed? Tell me about your âphantomâ designs.
Letâs keep this discussion going đ
Notes and References
Thanks to all of you who repost, comment and share your thoughts and examples! đž
This piece builds on findings from The Syntax of Equality project, where we investigate situation-based categorisation and nonclusive design through citizen science and field observations.
Further reading: The longitudinal dimension described here connects to the concept of âepiaccessibilityâ, developed in [2].
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References:
- Bowker, G. C., & Star, S. L. (1999). Sorting Things Out: Classification and Its Consequences. MIT Press.
- Hedvall, P.-O. (2009). The Activity Diamond-Modelling an Enhanced Accessibility. Doctoral thesis, Certec. LTH, Lund University.
- Willis, A.-M. (2006). Ontological DesigningâLaying the ground. Design Philosophy Papers, 3(January), 80â98. https://doi.org/10.2752/144871306X13966268131514
