Brief: Research a topic of your choice utilizing CoDesign. (Dr. Liz Sanders)
Location: The Ohio State University
Constraints: Utilize CoDesign methods; Generate insights OR a product by the final presentation
Collaboration: Team project with 3rd years Olivia Doland (Industrial Design), Rachel Schofield (Interior Design), and Averi Wolf (Interior Design)
Introduction:
As part of our 3rd year Design Research course taught by Liz Sanders, we were taught the basics of CoDesign (designing WITH clients, not FOR clients). Encouraged to explore topics of interest, my team decided to pursue synesthesia, when you experience one sense through the stimulation of another. For example, when you hear a certain pitch, you see a certain color.
Our semester consisted of methods exploration, pilot testing, documentation, CoDesign sessions, and several rounds of analysis between project presentations. We developed insights regarding how non-synthestetes (people without synesthesia) experience synesthete-like associations.
Check out our final presentation below, a culmination of everything we did this semester:
Lessons Learned:
This was a semester-long CoDesign project, which was very daunting when it was first introduced. However, by a few weeks in, we were having so much fun! Synesthesia was such a fun topic to explore, and it sparked a bunch of conversations between our classmates about what colors we associate with different letters or numbers. It was also really interested to talk to real synesthetes and attempt to understand how they perceive the world differently than what we will only ever know as normal.
"How can I describe it? Good food is like music you can taste, color you can smell. There is excellence all around you. You need only to be aware to stop and savor it."
- Auguste Gusteau, "Ratatouille"
