Kianna’s Everyday Assistive Technology Blog

I met with Stefanie to see what she had been working on. She showed me how she started introducing layering into the tactile embroidery pieces to help bring depth into the interpretations. This could be useful for the Devil patch as the flames sit in front of the devil. 

After reviewing some feedback I received last semester, I decided to make a few design changes, particularly to the devil patch. I plan to make the flames less compact with higher peaks I may even experiment with using a fill on the space.

I took time this week to update my profile on the VIP website 🙂

Last semester I took a course called “Access and Assistive Technology in Historic Sites and Museums,” where I worked with the Intrepid Museum on improving the accessibility of their exhibits. Embroidery is used a lot on the sailors’ uniforms, from mending holes in them to being used to depict occupation and class rank on the ship. These patches are traditionally behind glass and are not accessible to individuals who are blind or low vision. Tami Altschuler (Ph.D. candidate in Rehab Sciences at NYU, Speech-Language Pathologist at NYU Langone Medical Center), Yuanqing Li (M.S. Integrated Design & Media at NYU Tandon 2025), and I focused on making tactile interpretations of a few patches from the Intrepid Museums archives. After we finished our project, the museum expressed interest in using our patch interpretations on their touch tours. Reflecting on some of the feedback we received last semester, I would like to iterate and create copies of the tactile patch interpretations to give to the museums. 

Here is a link to our project site if you would like to read more about the project. (Link)

This week I attended Joseph and Cyrene’s sensory installation. I loved hearing about some of the changes they made throughout the semester to improve the experience. It was also super cute that people got to walk away with some essential oil to continue their experience even after they left the sensory room. The variety of fidget toys and the overall ambiance was great!