Innovations

By Sandra Kiume
July 23, 2006

The Design for Our Future Selves awards 2006 from the Royal College of Art offered seven awards for ‘An architecture, design or communication project which addresses a social issue or engages with a particular social group in order to improve independence, mobility, health or working life.’

Christopher Peacock won the Snowdon Award for Disability Projects and the Help the Aged Award for Independent Living with his invention handSteady. It’s an innovative device enabling people experiencing tremor (involuntary shaking caused by Parkinson’s disease, side effects from some medications and other conditions) to stabilize objects as they hold them.

Sohui Won, a finalist in Interaction Design, created psychological tools for treatment of loneliness in a project titled Weird Objects - Objects for autophobics and for all of us who experience loneliness and autophobia (fear of being alone). Among the creations:

‘Communication with Myself – Talk to Myself’. Objects were designed to help autophobics better understand their problem. ‘Talk to Myself’ Mask allows users to literally, talk to themselves. ‘Not’ Removal Machine is a device that removes the word ‘not’ from speech allowing people to hear the positive version.

‘Communication with Environment – Talk to Trees’. Two animated objects were designed to help connect people to the environment, so they wouldn’t feel alone: ‘Eyeballs’ is a device that follows people all the time, wherever they go. ‘Whispering Machine’ transfers the sound of movement into whispering and laughter. “

I’m not so sure about the eyeballs that follow you wherever you go, but I’d like to test that ‘Not’ Removal Machine.

Sandra Kiume is a mental health advocate and editor of Channel N who lives in Vancouver, Canada.