Had a fantastic chance to catch up with Wendy Keay-Bright last week, Reader in Inclusive Design, Department of Creative Communication at the Cardiff School of Art & Design in Wales. Wendy is an old friend, and hugely knowledgeable about universal design, particularly the needs of pupils on the autistic spectrum, through her work on Reactive Colours (where I met her during my time at NESTA) and latterly, in her continued work with Reactickles.
Wendy was here at Culture Lab in Newcastle as part of a two day workshop for the creation and distribution of openFrameworks developed Reactickles for the site, which was arranged and managed by Joey Scully. We had a fantastic time, analysing the value of different approaches to interfaces, doing some step-throughs for code for the small group, and hearing first hand from Wendy of the value of paring back functionality to simple levels, which can be incremented gradually as the user gets more confident. It’s really exciting to here of the attachments and value placed on the Reactive Colours work to date from testimonies from pupils who have grown up with the software, and the therapeutic it has brought to their lives by dint of familiarity, and textural qualities. The next generation of Reactickles start here… check out the site for more information.
