Mario Christoforides

  
marios.christoforides@gmail.com
0044 7929 295 827

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Following the dot: A voyage to a blind person's utopia

Name: Marios Christoforides
Pathway: Information Design
Title: ‘Following the dot: A voyage to a blind person’s utopia’

‘As a blind person I want to be able to do everything that other people do, especially where Information Technology is concerned.’
Mrs Dolly McLoughlin – Blind and Volunteer at RNIB*

‘Following the dot: A voyage to a blind person’s utopia’, is a project designed to encourage and give autonomy for the blind people, focused in Convent Garden shopping. By contacting the Royal National Institute of the Blind* - Centre of Tactile Maps and Diagrams and also by interviewing some volunteers I collected information, and developed a wayfinding coding system with the form of an index guide book. It is based on twenty-three tactile (relief images) maps/diagrams, braille text and a set of twenty-five geometrical symbols. The symbols identifiy and categorize the shops, the maps identify all the streets and together, it becomes the ultimate guide for a blind person, one of the most crowded areas in London.

* Above all, I’d like to be grateful to the following people who giving me the access, their instructions and the opportunity to use the techical facilities to produce the ambitious tactile guide book, Mrs Sue King (Tactile images, maps, and signage consultant) and all the techical stuff from RNIB at Peterborough, in UK.
– Special thanks to Mrs Dolly Mc Loughlin (Blind and Volunteer) for the pleasant interview and meetings that I had with her at RNIB in London, as well Mrs Karen Lipman (Library and Information Assistant, at RNIB) for her valuble help, advice and the arrangments for the meetings, with the people.
– I gratefully want to thank my tutors, colleagues, family and friends for their guidance and courage.

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Bonus

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Costas Bissas, MA Industrial Design, CSM for the collaboration of the 'Simulation Package' production.

www.costasbissas.com

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1. Following the dot: A voyage to a blind person's utopia/Guide Book, 2007
   Tactile Diagrams/ Symbols on a Sweel Paper
   B4
   Book Jacket-Cover
2. Following the dot: A voyage to a blind person's utopia/Guide Book, 2007
   Tactile Diagrams/ Symbols on a Sweel Paper
   B4
   Womenswear Symbol (spread from the book)
3. Following the dot: A voyage to a blind person's utopia/Symbols for the shops , 2007
   Digital Print B&W
   A2 Poster