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By: Jae Eun Kim, Valeriya Ten, Yixuan Liu, Haruhi Hosaka
Course: IAT 333 Interaction Design Methods

Description: This 14-week long interaction design project was part of IAT 333 Interaction Design Methods course, tasking us to come up with a design proposal, customized to an organization in community. Our organization was Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, a registered museum in Vancouver Chinatown featuring the first Ming-Dynasty style garden built outside of China.

As part of the project, we held in-person interviews with first-time visitors and participatory workshop with the Garden's docents. The visitors expressed the need for more interactive components, while the docents described how every part of the Garden is interconnected and carries a symbolic meaning. As a result, we determined that our job as an interaction designer is to enhance interactivity by weaving knowledge of symbolism into the visitors’ journey. Our final concept is the Symbolic Discovery Kit, designed to help first-time visitors learn about the Garden and its symbolic meaning; its goal is to provide a self-guided experience at the visitors' own pace.