There are two major strands to my research: the development of design methodology through making; and the application of relational approaches to designing for care. Occasionally, these strands come together. You can listen to me trying to explain what I do in this podcast:
5 Women 5 Questions – University of Edinburgh podcast series, Celebrating Women’s History Month March 2022: https://www.eca.ed.ac.uk/news/5-women-5-questions-celebrating-womens-history-month.
I regularly review for academic conferences in HCI and Design research, and:
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co-chair the ECA RAFT research group with Dr Jessamy Kelly, in which members discuss the development of craft and making
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am a member of the Arcintex steering group, a ‘research-through-design friendly network’ concerned with the commonalities of architecture, interaction design and smart textiles, led by the University of Boras in Sweden
Much of my work is collaborative and cross-disciplinary, and sometimes it generates physical and/or interactive things that can be exhibited. Venues for this kind of work have included: the RCA at the London Design Festival; the Lakeside Gallery, and Bonington Gallery, Nottingham; the House of Lords, London; the British Council in Milan; MIT Media Lab, Boston USA; Dundee Contemporary Arts; the CCA, Glasgow; InSpace Gallery in Edinburgh; the Bonhoga Gallery, Shetland; NiMK, and de Waag in Amsterdam; Leonardo Education Forum, Dallas; the Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh; the Museum of Culture in Kyoto, Japan; Futuresonic, Manchester; ISEA, Ireland; the Travelling Gallery, Scotland; and ElectroFringe, Australia.
Selected projects:
Healthier Working Lives - co-design to support older workers in the care sector
2021 – 2023 (CoI)
ESRC, with Kings College London, Care Scotland, Codebase, Creative Venue, and Legal & General
An Internet of Soft Things - participatory design of e-textile networks for mental health and wellbeing
2014 – 2016 (PI)
EPSRC, with the Nottinghamshire Mind Network
Electric Corset - historical costume archives informing design processes for wearables
2015 – 2017 (PI)
Nottingham Trent University QR funding
Aeolia - embedding stretch sensors in textiles
2008-2014 (PI)
alt-w, with support from Nottingham Trent University
ensemble - computationally networked jewellery with sound output
2006 – 2007 (PI)
AHRC, with support from the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh
Friendship Jewellery - computationally networked jewellery
2002-2007 (doctoral research)
Edinburgh Napier University doctoral scholarship, with support from Edinburgh College of Art and the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh
Selected recent publications:
Townsend, K., Kettley, S., and Walker, S. (2022). The Electric Corset and other Future Histories. In Townsend, K., Briggs-Goode, A. & Solomon, R. (Eds.), Crafting Anatomies. London: Bloomsbury.
Kettley, S. (2021). Wearables design and development in a shifting public health domain: towards the ‘fifth wave’. In A. Godfrey and S. Stuart (Eds.), Digital Health: Exploring Use and Integration of Wearables. Elsevier, pp319-344.
Kettley, S. (2021). Lifelines: users and designers as persons in relation. Airea Journal: Arts and Interdisciplinary Research, No 3 Interdisciplinary relationships within spaces and bodies of collaboration. http://journals.ed.ac.uk/airea.
Kettley, S. and Lucas, R. (2019). Design in Mental Health: a literature review of design thinking in UK and European mental health. In R. Cain and A. Petermans (Eds.), Design for Wellbeing. Abingdon: Routledge.
Kettley, S. and Kettley, R. (2017). Conceptualising Radically Careful Design. In Rodgers, P., G. Innella, C. Bremner & I. Coxon (2017), Does Design Care - An International Workshop of Design Thought and Action. Working Paper. Lancaster University, UK, 12-13 September 2017. DOI:10.13140/RG.2.2.24043.64805.