Conference on Gender Equality and Diversity in Design 2021

On 15 October 2021, Dr Anshika Suri was invited to give a keynote presentation on the theme of urban design at the conference Gender Equality and Diversity in Design, organised by the Schader Stiftung and the Institute for Design Research of the Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences.

The hybrid conference facilitated discussions from various fields, including industrial design, language, popular media, education, and AI, centred on the questions:

How can design become fairer, more sustainable and more inclusive? What role will diversity and gender equality play in shaping our digital and analog world in the future?

The event also aimed to promote greater connection between social sciences and practice.

For the session, Dr Suri presented the concept of her course at TU Darmstadt’s Faculty of Architecture, “Gender in the City”, which explicates how gender interact with spaces, technology, and everyday urban routines.

One of the case studies often explored by her students was mobility routines at TU Darmstadt’s Lichtwiese campus. Students’ visual analysis and exploratory walks have revealed insights such as preferred seating in public transport, choice of transport mode from campus after dark, which could inform better urban and mobility design.

Among the comments received after the presentation was: “Thank you for this work! After this I would see my city with a completely different pair of eyes.”