The Radically Inclusive Studio's Rituals of Belonging
Session 4: PARTICIPATORY RITUALS FOR HUMAN CONNECTION, BELONGING, AND SELF-CARE
Parsons MFA Interior Design’s
Studio 1: Radically Inclusive Interiors
Rituals of Belonging and Care
Michele Gorman, Faculty and Co-Director of Parsons
MFA Interior Design, Co-Founder of Sensory Inclusion
Lab and The Radically Inclusive Studio
Kimberly Tate, Faculty and Founder of BAMBULAWAN
Co-taught by faculty, Michele Gorman and Kimberly Tate, the Parsons MFAInterior Design’s
Radically Inclusive Studio redefines interiors as “action settings,” shifting the focus from aesthetic style to the capacity of spaces to facilitate interactions rooted in radical care, equity, and spatial justice. Operating as a Sensory and Spatial Inclusion Lab, the studio investigates the intersection of gender, disability, neurodiversity, and culture to challenge systemic barriers in the built environment. Students prioritize community building withinThe New School by cultivating relationships with accountability partners and building trust through co-creation activities and Memorandums of Understanding (MOU) that ensure reciprocity and interdependence.The featured “Rituals of Belonging” are a series of transformative, participatory installations designed to foster intersectional belonging and joy. Central to this practice is a radically inclusive feedback process that involves surveying feelings and gathering embodied insights from diverse participants and idiosyncratic embodiments to iteratively refine each experience beyond standardADArequirements. Grounded in circularity, these interventions utilize healthy, plant-based, and regenerative materials to reimagine interiors as inclusive spaces that celebrate a full spectrum of identities and embodiments.
Co-Authorship, Co-Teaching
Participation as process
Care as underlying principle
Justice as outcome
Community building
Compassionate learning
Compassionate Learning co-authorship
Figure 1: Towards compassionate learning design
ALT TEXT: Venn Diagram: Three intersecting circles, with text “participation as process”, “care as underlying principle” and “justice as outcome” and the intersection is “praxis”
Gachago, D., Bali, M., & Pallitt, N. (upcoming). Compassionate learning design as a critical approach to instructional design. In Janghiani, S. & J. Quinn (Eds.).Toward a Critical Instructional Design. PressBooks.
Compassionate Learning co-authorship
Gachago, D., Bali, M., & Pallitt, N. (upcoming). Compassionate learning design as a critical approach to instructional design. In Janghiani, S. & J. Quinn (Eds.).Toward a Critical Instructional Design. PressBooks.
Compassionate Learning co-authorship
Wehipeihana’s (2013) work on indigenous participation in monitoring and evaluation processes and its application to faculty/educational development, as presented by Carolyn Ives in Longstreet et al (2020), inspired our compassionate learning design model. Wehipeihana’s model can be helpful in showing different approaches to participation. Her model is about Western evaluation with Indigenous groups, and the levels of doing so involve:
● TO: evaluation doneTO indigenous groups, based on the assumption that Western experts know best.This is the most harmful form of evaluation. Participants are not invited to the table.Ameal is prepared for them based on what the designer assumes they need.
● FOR: evaluation done FOR Indigenous groups but by Westerners, which is benevolent but patronising. Participants are not invited to the table.Ameal is prepared for them after perhaps surveying them on dietary requirements.
● WITH: done together but probably with Western ways of doing things.This is the first step towards participation. Participants are invited to the table as guests and offered a variety of prepared meals to choose from.
● BY: done by and led by Indigenous groups (representation) but possibly still using world views of Westerners or needing to explain ways of doing things - i.e. participants are invited to join the preparation for a meal at a table, where they may help prepare the meal, but the ingredients and tools are already there.
● AS: led by Indigenous people and also complete autonomy to do with their worldview without having to justify - i.e. participants design their own table, bring their own ingredients and tools to make the meal their way.
Gachago, D., Bali, M., & Pallitt, N. (upcoming). Compassionate learning design as a critical approach to instructional design. In Janghiani, S. & J. Quinn (Eds.).Toward a Critical Instructional Design. PressBooks.
HOW DOES IT FEEL TO BE SUPPORTED?
HOW WAS THIS WARM DATA SHARED?
Fall 2023 MFA Interior Design Studio 1
(co-taught by Michele Gorman, Alfred Zollinger and TA Sydney
Moss)
Somatic drawings
Fall 2023 MFA Interior Design Studio 1
(co-taught by
Michele Gorman, Alfred Zollinger and TA Sydney Moss)
Fall 2023 MFA Interior Design Studio 1
(co-taught
by Michele Gorman, Alfred Zollinger and TA Sydney Moss)
24 Hours of Mind, Body, and Soul: Spatial Inclusion Lab for mental and cultural inclusion.
Vera List Courtyard: between 65 West 11th Street & 66 West 12th Street
Shreya Kameswaran, Nikitha Naredla, and Pamasha Naik
Inner Realms—Outer Rhythm: Spatial Inclusion Lab for access to mental rest and recovery through meditation and movement. Click here for Popup Locations
Amanda Davila and Kevin She
Healing through Breaking: Spatial Inclusion Lab for emotional release.
Parsons East: 25 East 13th Street, E200 studio, Second floor by the windows
Camilo Trujillo Morales, Galya Titova, and Naï Jammal Landsman
Raíces, A ritual around coffee: Spatial Inclusion Lab for nourishment through connection to roots and traditions.
Parsons East: 25 East 13th Street, Third floor by elevator
Ana Carrillo-Batalla Mattar and Carmen Sarg Lanza
Intentional Ceramic Workshop: Spatial Inclusion Lab for home making and belonging in the immigrant diaspora, expanding the need for making spaces, social connection and ceramics, or for anyone looking to create meaning and belonging in NYC.
Parsons East: 25 East 13th Street, Third floor in front of Donghia Gallery
Balbina Pozas and Tulia Torres
Zikra, Memorialization through Textiley: Spatial Inclusion Lab for community building and culturally inclusive storytelling by honoring the stories of women and femme people amongst students in higher design education.
Parsons East: 25 East 13th Street, E200 studio, Second floor by the windows
Anandita Vidyarthi and Jude Qassem
Gather ‘Round the Pot, Stories and Lunch Episodes: Spatial Inclusion Lab for fostering connection through food as our anchor.
Parsons East: 25 East 13th Street, E200 studio, Second floor by the windows
Minhee Kim and Alifiyah (Fia) Nabila
Gentle Fibers, Gentle Minds, A Wool Beading Workshop: Spatial Inclusion Lab for neurodiverse sensory recovery and stimulation spaces: Intersecting mental, spiritual and intellectual access needs.
Parsons East: 25 East 13th Street, E200 studio, Second floor by the meditation corner
Sarah Hyun and Sophie Schumacher
Sobremesa
By Alexa Montemayor Tatum, Ochi
Guerrero Arguello, and Marian
Almanza Oliveros
Sobremesa is a ritual that connects individuals through the sharing of food and conversation, transmitting the warmth and customs of Latin culture. Using fabric, thrifted plates, and decorative food, it creates a safe and intimate space where community and belonging are fostered. Through this shared act, those far from home can rediscover the comfort and familiarity of their origins.
How can the simple act of sharing a long meal over the day become a bridge back home and for belonging?
Marks We Leave
By Cagla Ekinci and Kula Ganesa Subramaniyan
Designed as an antidote to the restless pace and loneliness of city life, this ritual invites participants to embrace stillness and forge deeper human connections. With this ritual, we invite international students within the Parsons community to take a moment to connect with those around them, not only through conversation but also through self-expression.
After a long coffee session, they are encouraged to dump their coffee grounds directly onto the bio-based Mehndi-motif tabletop and use the painting tools to use henna and coffee to be creative and messy. We seek to create collaboration through self-expression.
Through cultural and memorial exchange,
is it possible to create a community or space that allows for self-expression without judgment?
Resonance
By Tejaswini Mukundh and Mallika Sharma
Resonance is a sensory ritual that offers a space for mental decluttering through playful interaction with colorful threads and musical strings. Participants are invited to tangle, untangle, braid, the threads and pluck the strings, engaging their senses of touch, sight, and hearing to find calm and connection amidst the colors and vibrations. The experience transforms stress into rhythm, allowing a moment of grounding, peace, and quiet companionship.
How can a single space be interpreted and experienced in various ways to help your state of mind and sense of belonging via one’s interaction with a harmony of acoustics, color, materiality and people?
Mind Stretching
By Carlota Riveroll and Andrea Hubard
Through “Mind Stretching” we aim to make students who are pursuing their undergraduate or graduate degrees and consider themselves to be going through a quarter life crisis to reframe their expectations and anxieties over the future through the technique of collage. We want students to leave feeling free, loose, and flexible, the way you would feel after stretching your body, but with your mind. This experience combines metaphysical experience with actual physical action, allowing students to work with their hands to give their minds a mindful break.
How can we, the students of The New School, deconstruct our anxieties and mental pitfalls in order to reframe our expectations and anxieties over the future through the technique of collage?
Soundarya- A Ritual Around Skincare
By Shreya Gottumukkala and Kavisha Doshi
Soundarya” is an immersive sensory experience that reconnects individuals with their body and mind through the practice of skincare. Using natural ingredients as a playful medium for discovery, the space invites participants to craft their own body masks while engaging with others and the materials around them. It becomes a shared ritual of touch, texture, and connection, where care is both personal and collective.
How can the sensory experience of Indian natural ingredients through skincare reconnect us to our bodies and minds? “
Spice Tent
By Leela Amladi and Maia Lafortezza
The Spice Pavilion is a mobile installation designed as a retreat from the high-pressure environment of higher education, offering participants a space to slow down, reconnect with themselves, and engage with others. Through multi-sensory experiences—sight, sound, touch, smell, and taste—participants explore and interact freely with hanging spice installations and chai, finding grounding through active meditation. The project centers accessibility, neurodiverse perspectives, and relational participation, inviting community contribution and ownership while creating a space of open exploration and sensory reflection.
“How might chai serve as a prototype for creating mobile spaces of curiosity, calm, and connection?”
Shadow Boxing: A Ritual of Release
By Alex Lowe and Omar Seda
Shadow Boxing is a participatory ritual for graduate students navigating finals stress.
Guided by a projected shadow, participants move through zones of tension, release, and recovery. Inspired by combat sports, this installation transforms physical expression into collective empowerment. “Shadow Boxing” is a participatory ritual designed to engage the graduate community within the School of Constructed
Environments. In this gamified, interactive experience, participants follow a projected shadow as it guides them through a sequence of stretching, movement, and rest. The installation features:
Spider webbed roped stretching and warm-up room
Sensory punching bag zone
Breaking zone for symbolic release Cool-down zone for reflection and recovery
This ritual responds to the heightened stress many graduate students experience during finals. By offering a physical outlet for tension, it invites participants to release pent-up energy in a safe, expressive environment.
The concept emerged from Alex and Omar’s shared experience with combat sports—and their mutual recognition of how liberating it can feel to strike pads or a punching bag. “Shadow Boxing” channels that sense of empowerment into a collective, cathartic design intervention.
How can striking and smashing objects help release tension and stress?
UNNATURAL NATURE: Dream
Space for Reconnecting Mind and Body
Creators:
Isac Blücher, Andrea Miller, Mark Séjourné
The ritual begins outside of the lighting lab on the 3rd floor. Participants are told to remove their shoes and prepare their minds for a period of mental freedom/untethering. The space is one to experience alongside others, but it is not intended for conversation. Entering the room, participants will walk down a gauzy corridor constructed of fabric hanging from the ceiling, and emerge into a space where projections and colored lights create an atmosphere of tranquility and peacefulness. A droning synth/sine wave sound is played over speakers and as time goes on, this soundscape builds to include bird songs and soft piano. The lights pulse very slowly to encourage restful breathing and slowed heart rates. Participants are encouraged to move freely throughout the space and interact with the fabric installations as they see fit.
How can we manipulate space to have the same effect on our minds and body as we get from being in nature while using
“artificial” elements specific to the human made interior?
The soundscape will fade out until it's a droning pulsating tone again. Eventually, after 15 minutes have passed, silence will take over the room and the lights will return to a neutral state. Participants will be gently guided out of the room to re-acclimatize to their lives with renewed energy.
Especially within the context of an open-floor plan studio with no spaces dedicated to privacy and sensory recovery, how can we provide a built environment that allows for a sense of community / togetherness without requiring explicit socialization through performance/perception?
Circle of Discovery
By Zilong Yu and Sining Chen
This ritual transforms circulation into exploration through a series of playful spatial games where participants search for hidden puzzle pieces throughout the space, guided by visual cues rather than screens. As pieces are found, everyone gathers around a central circular seating structure to assemble the puzzle together, shifting from individual wandering to community interaction. Through shared movement, exploration, and collaboration, the space becomes a site of connection that invites people to talk to each other about their surroundings.
How can play turn a classroom interior space into an environment of discovery, connection, and belonging?
Fall 2024
Sensory Recovery Room
for the Open Design Studio
Spatial Inclusion Lab for neurodiverse sensory recovery and stimulation spaces: Intersecting mental, spiritual and intellectual access needs. & Workshop: Gentle Fibers, Gentle Minds, A Wool Beading Workshop:
Parsons East: 25 East 13th Street, E200 studio, Second floor by the meditation corner
Sarah Hyun and Sophie Schumacher
Fall 2025
Low sensory space spruce-up
Tended to and created by Keith
Geldof
Do you ever feel completely overwhelmed by your surroundings?
In the university environment, in particular, in the open studio environment we are surrounded by “community”. This communal landscape has many pros and many cons. As our educational space is shared, it can lead to sensory overload. The space is alive with people, chatter, activity, moods and energies, good-days, bad-days, stress, echos and sometimes even birds! We are in a community, to some degree, by default. This space allows for a moment of decompression. A private space that provides an opportunity to recenter. However and in whatever way that looks for an individual: prayer, meditation, quiet, rest or escape.
This space is intended to support the community, by supporting the people in it.
Show year 1 welcome party that considers international welcome and connections
Curriculum of Care and InclusiveAssessment
Fink’s taxonomy
Need for new assessment practices when we center relational practices of care
