Bloomington Entertainment & Arts District

Introduction
Our team is collaborating with the Executive Director of the Bloomington Area Arts Council and the Bloomington Entertainment and Arts District (BEAD) to create concepts and a design plan; addressing interaction techniques that will improve the current methods of downtown education and increase student activity in the downtown district.

Our Approach
To stimulate our imaginations and capture people's experiences we used cultural probes as our method for pursuing experimental design. Eight cultural probe packs were distributed to a diversified set of people, representing the demographics of the city. The openness of the design problem, and the amount of quantitative demographic data available, allowed us to explore many aspects of the residents attitudes.

Our team reviewed the returned probe materials in mid-March, following user interviews. While sorting through the maps, photocards, and photographs, differentiated views and insights between demographic groups emerged. These insights were synthesized and revealed opportunitiy areas for us to design.