scott alberstein
Industrial + Interaction Designer
A line of storage containers designed to be blind accessible through the use of tactile form association.
By taking advantage of the blind's refined sense of touch, food can be identified by the various sizes, shapes, and textures of the jars they are within.
By using form association to identify products, the blind no longer need to label and relabel many of their food items; which can be costly and time consuming.
Skills: Ethnographic & Academic Research, 3D Modeling, Model Making & Prototyping
“We scarcely know how much of our pleasure and interest in life comes to us through our eyes until we have to do without them; and part of that pleasure is that the eyes can choose where to look. But the ears can't choose where to listen.” – Ursula K. Le Guin
I worked closely with Joe and Katherine, two members of Pittsburgh’s Associate for the Blind. They provided immense insight about the daily life of the blind. Joe has been blind since age 8, and Katherine has been blind her entire life.
I asked Joe and Katherine to take me through some of their belongings and talk about what they are, what they do, and how they use them. My goal was to understand methods they used to navigate their home and interact with products. What I discovered were three main methods: Kinesthetic Memory, Braille Labels, and Hierarchy of Organization.
What interested me most about their belongings was that Joe and Katherine relied heavily on the shape of things for identification. They even go so far as to buy certain brands due to their unique shape. You wouldn’t want to mistake bleach for milk, for example. In these photos, Joe talks about buying products and kitchenware with distinct shapes or textures.
I identified an opportunity where I could use principles of hierarchy as well as form and texture to drive a new line of organizational equipment for the visually impaired. I could leverage form association, and kinesthetic memory to drive the design of a new line of household products.
I focused on creating a variety of different forms such that they could be identified through touch, while maintaining a cohesive form language throughout.
Tact is a line of containers designed to appeal to the blind’s refined sense of touch. By varying the size, shape, and texture of the vessels, the blind can use them to store various items without the need for labeling.
