Haptic design research: A blind sense of place

Abstract

While architecture is experienced with all senses, the visual tends to receive most attention. This paper focuses on the role of haptics, i.e. the sense of touch, in the built environment and reports on the development of haptic design parameters to support architects in paying more attention to the haptic implications of their design decisions. Haptic qualities and constraints in the built environment were identified with the help of people who are congenitally blind, as they are more attentive to non visual senses, and with professionals working with them. This paper summarizes and triangulates the results of these empirical studies and outlines the basis of the haptic design parameters derived from them. Following the classification of haptics into active, dynamic and passive touch, the built environment unfolds into surfaces that can act as “movement”, “guiding” and/or “rest” plane. Furthermore some techniques are suggested to check the haptic qualities of a design.