Series of projects that focus on wayfinding design, specifically creating inclusive orientation and information panels that enhance the accessibility of the built environment. The panels are designed to guide all users effectively, making public spaces more navigable and user-friendly. By improving wayfinding, everyone, regardless of ability, can easily access and understand their surroundings.

Inclusive tactile maps and models are more than just touchable and visual representations; they serve as an educational toolkit, providing city information to both people with disabilities and those without. Gradually introducing users from small elements to large, keeping and marking a fixed reference point (connection between representation/maps), and comparing different sizes are effective steps in understanding essential concepts like reading a map, scaling, and navigating the urban environment to grasp the city’s structure.

The images presented are part of different projects I have worked on along the years:

1. Series of maps about Bucharest, used in workshops about urban planning for people with visual disabilities at The Urban Mobility Club, an AMAIS project where people with and without disabilities taught each other how to adapt to an unfriendly environment like Bucharest. These maps were designed and produced after conducting focus groups and testing sessions with people with and without disabilities. They are also educational instruments in Tactile Maps workshops where we teach people with visual disabilities about map reading, scale and other similar concepts. 

2. Series of complementary information and orientation instruments used at the Urban Mobility Club to develop mental mapping skills and make city structure development and history more accessible for blind people:

•  Volumetric/tactile prints: these are used to convey information to participants about the evolution of Bucharest over time and space.
• A tactile map: this map shows the density of the city’s old fabric, compared to areas defined by contemporary structures.
• Scale models: these represent various types of apartment blocks (tower block; 12-story block; typical 8-story block; typical 4-story block), individual houses (small, single-story; large, two-story), and a human silhouette.
• A model of the Palace of Parliament compared with human silhouettes: this model illustrates the actual size of one of the largest buildings in the world, helping participants grasp its real-world scale.

3. Information and orientation panel design for Vacaresti Natural Park after doing the accessibility analysis report. Given the available budget, we had to also prioritize what would have been more useful to design for blind and D/deaf people in this first phase. 

4. Orientation panel for the headquarters of Societe Generale in Bucharest. The design of the panel also implied testing with people with and without disabilities in the design phase, but also in use. 

5. The wayfinding design system designed for the waterfront project in Mahmudia. The amount of information selected was tested in focus groups where prototypes have been made. The end results is a series of 4 maps of the whole promenade, 9 information panels on flora, fauna and rocks, 4 maps of existing constructions, 1 information and orientation of the playground, 2 bronze models of the areas of interest (Mahmudia and Dobrogea) and a series of bronze plates that showcase Danube’s routes from spring to the where it meets the sea.

6. The orientation system designed for La Firul Ierbii community center. These maps are also part of the Tactile Maps workshops where we teach people with visual disabilities about map reading, scale and other similar concepts. They are useful because you can compare what you can touch in the map with how the space is arranged.