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Dr Rachael Luck

Senior Lecturer

School of Engineering & Innovation

rachael.luck@open.ac.uk

Biography

Professional biography

Since the mid twentieth century there have been distinct phases to the study of design. Each connects design research with different methods and particular understandings of human conduct in the material world. The research Rachael undertakes studies how design work actually takes place in everyday settings. Her research examines how people organise design work, to co-design and co-construct new realities and engage with the societal challenge of disability inclusion, contributing to research in the fields of: design studies, co-design, participatory design and disability-inclusion. It is informed by Rachael's experience working as a chartered architect in practice on many built envionment projects.

This research involves ethnographic and video-based studies of interaction in everyday settings. Her research has been funded by awards from ERC, ESRC, EPSRC, AHRC, Enable Foundation, Motability Foundation and the RIBA and is undertaken in close collaboration with participants, practitioners and publics.

Projects:

Motability Foundation studentship 'Making public spaces and transport hubs accessible by design' £97,388 2024-2028.

Enable Foundation 'Objects talk EEE' £1,875 2023.

Co-lead on Research Plan Next Generation project 'Researchers with disabilities' and the conference 'Exploring Equitable Research Careers' Open University 21st September 2023.

European Research Council ‘Universalism, universal design and equitable access to the designed environment’ €853,000 to investigate the role and relevance of universal design with Goldsmiths College London 2013-2016.

ESRC Seminar Series ‘Designing inclusive environments: shaping transitions from theory into practice’ with Goldsmiths College London 2013-2014.

Open University and BBC Partnership 'Inventing the impossible: the big life fix' https://connect.open.ac.uk/science-technology-engineering-and-maths/inventing-the-impossible-the-big-life-fix

Evidence adopted for Cross-Party Women and Equalities Committee, Building for Equality: Disability and the Built Environment, 

Responsibilities: Associate Dean for Research and Scholarship in STEM Faculty (2019-2022), School Director of Research (2015-2019), Deputy Editor and member of the Editorial Board for the journal Design Studies (2007-2023), Member of Co-Design journal Editorial Board (2023 -). 

I can offer PhD supervision on studies of architectural design in practice, co-design, participatory design and design for disability-inclusion.

 

Projects

Publications

Book Chapter

Foundational theory and methodological positioning at the outset of a design research project (2024)

'Does this compromise your design?' socially producing a design concept in Talk-in-Interaction (2009)

Project briefing for an inclusive universal design process (2001)

Journal Article

‘It is not rocket science but it can change our lives’: pluriversal design with FabLab Nepal at a spinal injury clinic (2024)

“I just filled out a form” Experiences of Doctoral Students with Disabilities, Long-term Health Conditions and/or Additional Study Needs (2024)

Access and mobility in Milton Keynes: an inclusive design history where urban planning ideals and design intent meet disability politics (2022)

Design research, architectural research, architectural design research: an argument on disciplinarity and identity (2019)

[Editorial] What is it that makes participation in design participatory design? (2018)

Participatory design in architectural practice: Changing practices in future making in uncertain times (2018)

Inclusive design and making in practice: Bringing bodily experience into closer contact with making (2018)

Organising design in the wild: locating multidisciplinarity as a way of working (2015)

Learning how to use buildings: an exploration of the potential of design interactions to support transition to low-impact community living (2014)

Designing inclusive environments: rehabilitating the body and the relevance of universal design (2014)

Seeing architecture in action: designing, evoking and depicting space and form in embodied interaction (2014)

Articulating (mis)understanding across design discipline interfaces at a design team meeting (2013)

Living From Home (2013)

Professionalism in digitally mediated project work (2013)

‘Doing designing’: on the practical analysis of design in practice (2012)

Kinds of seeing and spatial reasoning: examining user participation at an architectural design event (2012)

Portals to the World: Technological Extensions to the Boundaries of the Home (2012)

Using objects to coordinate design activity in interaction (2010)

‘Does this compromise your design?’ Interactionally producing a design concept in talk (2009)

Learning to talk to users in participatory design situations (2007)

Using artefacts to mediate understanding in design conversations (2007)

Architect and user interaction: the spoken representation of form and functional meaning in early design conversations (2006)

Dialogue in participatory design (2003)

Project briefing for accessible design (2001)

Presentation / Conference

‘I’ve learned that I function as the sort of interface’: Supporting disabled PGRs to navigate the ‘faceless monster’ of university systems and processes (2024)

Notions of designing inclusively from practitioner perspectives (2022)

Design activism in a pandemic, towards a life otherwise (2020)

User Centered Design Approaches to Measuring Canine Behavior: Tail Wagging as a Measure of User Experience (2018)

Journeys in the City: Empathising With the Users of Transport Buildings (2016)

What is it about space that is important in interaction? (2014)

An ecology of design coordination: multidisciplinarity as a way of working (2011)

'So the big rocks we put in the jar': using situated reasoning to coordinate design activity (2010)

Analysing design activity in architect and user talk-in-interaction (2009)

Dialogue in participatory design (2002)

Developing shared language and value (2001)

Deafness, design, and communication: an overview of Project Crystal (2001)

Project Crystal: accessible environments for deaf and hard of hearing people (2001)

Influence of colour on the inclusivity of an environment (2001)

Does inclusive design require an inclusive design process? (2000)

Deafness, design and communication in the built environment (2000)

Use of construction research by industry (1994)

Construction research in UK universities and its use by industry (1994)

Report

Evaluation of parish planning in West Berkshire: report for the West Berkshire Partnership (2006)

Flexible working in central government: leveraging the benefits (2004)