Milk Carton by Factory

The DBA Design Challenge 2000 - 'care for our future selves'

Wednesday 6 December, Royal College of Art

The DBA Design Challenge drew a capacity audience of 240 to the Upper Gulbenkian Gallery at the Royal College of Art. Organised by the Small Business Programme in collaboration with the Design Business Association (DBA), the DBA Design Challenge was a creative ongoing response to the need of young disabled people for good consumer design.

The triggers for the event were the publication of two official reports - The Audit Commission's 'Fully Equipped' highlighted the poor levels of design endemic to the disability aids and equipment sector, while a study published in August 2000 by the DTI described the difficulties disabled people have in using everyday consumer products.

Representatives of the design, disability, academic and business communities viewed and debated presentations by four of the UK's leading design consultancies: The Renfrew Group; Priestman Goode; Factory Design Ltd and Designhouse.

3D printer
by Priestman Goode

From the project's inception, the shortlisted DBA member firms worked with user groups to develop innovative design scenarios focused on the aspirations of younger disabled users, identified as the most overlooked group in all product and service categories. The Renfrew Group developed a personalised drive-by-wire control for a car that can be programmed to the individual needs of the user via a smart card. Priestman Goode's 'Sensory Web' exploited the conceptual possibilities inherent in the rapid prototyping process to offer a 3D printer that could download images from the Web as three-dimensional objects. Factory Design took on the standard milk carton and, with critical input from Arthritis Care, redesigned it from scratch. Their design is compatible with high volume production standards yet is easy to open, pour and reseal. Working with a user group of visually impaired computer users, Designhouse created a website design for a sports-based broadband internet channel that is compatible with different colour blindness conditions, works on aesthetic grounds and can be browsed by blind users.

Driver interface by Renfrew

The public forum was introduced by Lord Snowdon, Provost of the Royal College of Art and followed by a keynote speech from Dr Kim Howells, the Consumer Affairs Minister who commissioned the DTI report and whose South Wales constituency has high rates of work-related disability. Howells underlined the impact of poor design on the lives of his constituents and the underlying human rights issues it raised. After a lively debate between the audience and the panel of design consultancies, Ray Hodgkinson, President of the Healthcare Trades Association and Graham Corbett CBE, Chair of Ricability responded to the presentations from the viewpoints of industry and consumers.

For details of the DBA Design Challenge and the Small Business Programme contact Julia Cassim.

A full transcript of the DBA Challenge event is now available for download as a 136K Rich Text File.