Designers
Eva Barth
Year
2026
Category
New Talent
Country
Germany
School
Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design
Teacher
Norris Hung, Jose Chavarría, Chris Downs
Three questions to the project team
What was the particular challenge of the project from a UX point of view?
The main challenge was designing for grief, which is a highly individual experience and can be expressed in many different ways. Each person connects to grief in their own way, so the experience needed to create a safe space where people would feel comfortable opening up, allowing emotions, and engaging with the installation at their own pace. A key part of the project was developing an embodied language that felt natural and meaningful, which required more than 25 prototypes before arriving at an interaction that genuinely resonated with people and felt emotionally impactful rather than merely symbolic.
What was your personal highlight in the development process? Was there an aha!-moment, was there a low point?
One of my most meaningful moments came during prototyping and user testing. After many prototype iterations that were described as feeling artificial, a participant squeezed the soft crochet ball and immediately started crying, saying it felt exactly like what they would have needed when their dad passed away: a warm, supportive hand to hold and squeeze. That moment confirmed the interaction was truly resonating. Another highlight was the public project exhibition, where many inspiring conversations emerged and people openly shared their stories, not only with me, but also with each other, creating a genuine sense of community and mutual support.
Where do you see yourself and the project in the next five years?
I see the project as an ongoing process of transformation and iteration, much like life itself. Rather than a finished outcome, it continues to evolve through new contexts and conversations. In the coming years, I want to further explore ritual design and emotional spaces that are often overlooked in experience design, drawing on cross-cultural practices and nature to support meaningful human connection. Through conversations with psychotherapists, the project has also shown potential to expand beyond grief into areas like trauma support, meditation, and broader emotional wellbeing.
