Written by Walei Subray Born in Egypt and raised in New York City, I’m a classic New Yorker. The only difference about me is that I drag a 58-inch black cane across the streets and sidewalks. That’s because I was born with a progressive eye condition called retinitis pigmentosa. As a child, I could see...

Written by Steven Landau As a company of designers and producers of tactile maps and models, Touch Graphics, Inc. usually focuses on products that communicate spatial information through the sense of touch for use by visually impaired students and museum visitors. Occasionally, the company develops tools to support blind artists and scientists.  One of our...

Written by Claire Kearney-Volpe In 2016, Mayor Bill de Blasio and the New York City Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities presented the Ability Project with the ADA Sapolin Award for their “fearless and innovative approach to developing tools that will improve the lives of people with disabilities.” The Ability Project builds relationships and designs...

A pioneer of inclusive design, August de los Reyes looks at the innovations inspired by loved ones.

Ryan Maloney, Directory of Education and Programming at the National Jazz Museum in Harlem, connects the themes found in The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s with the musical culture in Harlem at the time.

James Stalzman of the Manhattan School of Music discusses the musical pieces he paired with particular objects from The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s.

Brooklyn-based graphic design studio Other Means discusses designing the book that accompanies the exhibition and their approach to "American" design.

Just before joining Cooper-Hewitt (C-H) I clocked a lot of time on its newly revealed collections portion of its website. Searching the database of more than 115,000 objects using the “random” search function became my favorite method of choice. I felt as if I were mining for treasure, with each attempt sure to land on...