Design as Care
This series explores how design can serve as a form of care in itself. Drawing from museum practice and translating it into aging and dementia contexts, I focus on approaches that improve quality of life today. These reflections highlight how participation, delight, and multisensory engagement can support residents, families, and staff—showing that care doesn’t have to wait for decades of new treatments.
Contextual Design
Above: Memory Care Experience Station, designed into a lounge
Below: Children’s Creativity Museum Early Childhood Gallery
Delight as a Design Tool
A life enrichment staff member testing out a question I had: reminiscence is powerful, but what about phenomena? Could that also shift people into a state of delight?
Iterative Design in Care Settings
This image shows a grid of residents, families, and staff participating in early test sessions of a project called the Memory Care Experience Station. Over 190 sessions like these informed its design, with each interaction offering feedback—through words, gestures, and shared moments—that shaped the final experience.
Participation Is Not Optional Decoration
Created for the Walker Art Center’s Internet Cat Video Festival, this tongue-in-cheek interactive turned the act of watching cat videos into something new: people watching themselves imitate cats on a giant scale. A mobile recording booth roamed the Minnesota State Fairgrounds, capturing playful clips that were later edited together and screened before 11,000 festivalgoers.
Let’s Talk About VR.
Exploring advanced dementia engagement and the current state of VR.
Illustration: Mortati Image: Shutterstock
