Tag: wayfinding
Tactile maps help the blind find their way
A recent field study has provided new insight into the role of tactile maps in facilitating wayfinding for visually impaired persons. 12 participants who have varying degrees of visual impairment but “proximate ages and similar cognitive development” participated in the experiment, which took place at the Education Center of the Federal University of Pernambunco in […]
How kids use landmarks to find their way
It’s tough to develop a mental map unless you can rely on landmarks and wayfinding tools to anchor your route. Adults increasingly rely on GPS, rendering the art of manual wayfinding less common than it was a decade ago. But children in the six- to ten-year-old age group might be old enough to be entrusted […]
On wayfinding tools for older adults
By the year 2030, nearly one in five Americans will be 65 years of age or older. That’s a dramatic increase from 2000, when the figure was more like one in eight. Researchers and the media have addressed many implications associated with the aging population, but one side effect is just beginning to attract attention: […]
Mobile wayfinding goes indoors
When’s the last time you pulled out a map to plan a route? How about stopping at a convenience store to ask for directions? Tech-free wayfinding is about as passé as the pay phone. Technological advancements have brought us from verbal directions to paper maps to printed out maps using services like MapQuest to portable navigation units […]
Startup wayfinding company creates the “Google Maps” of indoor spaces
“You want to get to Ernie’s desk? Okay, go through the double doors to my right, take that hallway until it ends in a T, turn right, make your fourth left after the water cooler, then turn right at the potted ficus tree and he’s in the fifth cubicle on your left.” Ugh. In an […]
Adaptable wayfinding graphics strengthen brand
You are sadly mistaken and far behind the times if you still think a sign is nothing more than a message printed on sheet metal. These days, signs are metaphorically malleable. They’re changeable. Their messages can be adjusted based on ever-shifting needs. Case in point: the graphics created by Aion Solutions, an Indiana-based branding company, […]
International artists redesign maps for “Mapping the City” exhibit
What happens when you ask street and graffiti artists to map a city they know intimately through their previous creative endeavors? That’s the question that drove the curators behind Mapping the City, an art exhibit at Somerset House, in London, through February 15. And the answers, as one might guess, are far from conventional. The […]